


The Fashion in Shrouds

by ljs



Series: Investigations and Acquisitions [4]
Category: Angel: the Series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: AU, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-14
Updated: 2011-12-14
Packaged: 2017-10-27 08:23:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 34,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/293709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ljs/pseuds/ljs
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The sequel to "Death in a White Tie," set a month later: Featuring Junior Watchers and assistants, domesticity, dates, a MI6 spymaster and his grandmother, an unhappy pretence, demon-deaths, Motown, cool white wine, and an August heat wave.</p><p>Acknowledgements: The works of Margery Allingham, Agatha Christie, and Motown Records. As always, this contains some characters from the BBC series <em>Spooks</em>/.</p><p>Written Spring 2004.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The young archivist nodded to the security guard as he passed, then hurried his steps. Thank heavens it was Friday, he thought. His plans consisted of a pint or two at the Sign of the Book, then home for some bad telly and a great deal of sleep; it’d been a bloody trying day, what with that unexpected visitor grubbing around in the files, and he deserved the weekend off.

Stepping outside, he inhaled the Montague Place air. The streets were ripe with lingering rubbish smells and old grease. Hadn’t had a good rain for almost a month now, and London needed it.

A group of tourists chattered by him as he turned toward Russell Square – last of the summer flocks, he thought with an uncharacteristic flight of fancy. The thought carried him a few steps further, until a passerby bumped into him. "Pardon me," he began.

But then there was a hand full of something foully sweet clapped over his nose, and a fall into hot, decayed nothingness –

He awoke to confusion. What he registered first was deepest dark, and then sound and rhythm: the walls and floor rumbled, a heavy, regular chunk-chunk-chunk that reminded him of too loud car stereos on a distant street. When he tried to lift his hands, he found he couldn’t move. Chained.

A basso profundo voice came out of the blackness. "Let me just confirm: you are Geoffrey David Perry? Specialist in Celtic and Anglo-Saxon Antiquities, the British Museum?’

"Ye-yes," he got out. His throat had almost closed, as if the bass in the voice and the walls were crushing him. After a cough, he said more evenly, "Yes. Who are you?"

"Consider me your intake specialist," the voice said. "I have a few questions regarding a cup."

"A cup–?"

"Yes. A quite special one, just the sort of thing a bright man familiar with antiquities should know about." Although Geoff couldn’t see, he could feel movement in front of him: pressure-shift in the air, on the floor. He could hear a hiss. "Have you ever heard of Yeangelt?"

The name tickled at his memory, not something he knew, something he had half-heard – but "No."

From behind, a bar hit his shoulders. A second to feel the impact, and then an involuntary "Oh God" as the pain rushed up, dark on dark.

"Thank you, Master Hat. Well struck," the voice said. "Mr. Perry, let me ask you again, now that you know we’re serious. Have you ever heard of Yeangelt?"

"No, really," he said. When the second blow came, this one hard enough to crack his shoulder blade, he bit back a scream. Sodding well wasn’t going to make a noise.

Even if he hadn’t yet been fully admitted into the new Council, Geoff Perry knew how a Watcher should act under torture.

***

She lunged. It should have been a hit, she thought, but her blade somehow went wide even before her opponent countered and sent it wider still. She fought to regroup, to keep her grip. Metal rang against metal again, then there were only the sounds of feet sliding on the mat, harsh filtered breathing, cries and buzzers and rumbling traffic outside.

She slid back into position, considering the next move. Sure, his reach was a lot longer than hers, and he knew a lot more, but she had to be faster.

Yet when she feinted, then lunged again, he had already twisted out of range. His return hit shocked her fingers with its force on her blade, slipped through her guard. The blunt point pressed against her heart before he let his sword fall.

"Okay, that’s three," Dawn said with ill grace. "In a row even. You won again."

Pulling off his fencing mask, Giles exhaled hard. He was red with exertion, his hair edged with sweat. "You did very well, though. I had to work at it."

"Yeah, but you already fought a couple of bouts this morning! You should be noodle-y and slow by now," she said after taking off her own mask. When he sent her an old-school Giles-look, sort of ‘think what you’re saying, stupid child,’ she blushed. "You know what I mean."

"Yes. At my age it’s a miracle I can even walk without a pair of sticks, much less fence for an hour," he said, as he began his cool-down stretches.

"Giles, I didn’t mean that!"

She really didn’t, not when she thought about it. It was hard to cherish an image of ancient, book-dusty Giles when, to take only the latest example, that morning she and Andrew had gone down to the kitchen to steal some milk and had found the master of the house smooching the mistress of the house, who was perched on the kitchen counter with her legs wrapped around his waist. Their robes had still been on, thank God, because otherwise Dawn’s eyes would have to be burned out or something, and personally she felt that breakfast should be a sex-free zone, but whatever. Maybe she and Andrew should just spend their time in the attic space designated for them. They did have their own refrigerator, TV, and broadband connection, after all.

And, even with having to deal with older-guy/ex-vengeance-demon displays of extremely intense affection, London was about a million times better than Cleveland. There was no weepy Willow planted in the midst of burgeoning Wicca texts and college catalogues, no gross Xander and Faith attempts at lust-slash-‘friendship’ (now that Wood had been kicked to the curb) and no fumbling Xander attempts to explain same, and no big sister slamming in and out of the house to or from Ecuador, or Georgia, or Mars. Buffy slammed in and out of everywhere these days, never saying much. Dawn wondered what she’d said to Giles that day –

"Dawn. Dawn." Giles was talking in that overly patient voice that meant she’d missed at least three crucial statements. "I asked if you were going back to the house after your instruction."

"Um. I think so." At the mention of her lesson, however, she glanced over to the man standing by the open windows, lit by hot yellow sun. The proprietor of the studio, Pablo – tall, super-cut even in his padded jacket, his long hair braided like a pirate or something – was talking to his eleven o’clock student. Yeah, she could think of a lot of lessons she’d like to take from him –

"Oh, never mind," Giles said. When she turned around, he was disappearing into the men’s changing room.

She still had ten minutes left – she’d lost in embarrassingly record time – so she went to her gym bag, which she’d left underneath the bench that ran the length of the wall, and pulled out her notebook. Her Watcher-in-training notebook, she thought with a small thrill; much cooler than those diaries she used to (not really) keep.

Her school, which now was an elite Watcher-supported academy near the British Museum, didn’t start for another month or so. But in exchange for living rent-free at the Giles-Jenkins house and small stipends, it had been agreed that both Dawn and Andrew would work for Investigations and Acquisitions in whatever capacity they could find. Plus, Giles made sure that her jobs were research-related; it was kind of like her own long-term internship.

No, it was like being a Scooby for real, she corrected herself. Also, the cool thing about having Andrew as a best friend was she never had to feel like the biggest nerd in the room any more.

Sitting down and opening the notebook, she lost herself in the lines that Giles had brought back from yesterday’s trip to the British Museum’s archives – _The Xet means the rising time, when the interlopers fall. The river will dry, but dead blood will run. The sign, the word, the cup..._ There would be keys to this, she thought: deciphering what could be meant by "rising," or by "interlopers," which was way different from just "humans." She got a pen from her bag and began to underline.

"Excellent, Dawn," Giles said, appearing beside her. "That’s what I’d like you to work on this afternoon – see if you can start cross-referencing any of those keys, perhaps check some of the dictionaries of metaphor and prophecy."

She smiled up at him, then stopped on a wave of indignance. "Work this afternoon? Work? But it’s Saturday!"

"Um-hm. And you and Andrew skived off yesterday to spend hours at Forbidden Planet. Which, yes, Anya and I figured out, our clue being the sacks of comics you didn’t manage to hide," he said pleasantly. At her mutter, he smiled and put his hand on her shoulder. "You’re just to make up the hours you, um, stole. That way I can start work on both our sets of notes Monday morning."

"Okay, okay, whatever," she said. When she looked at him, really looked, her smile returned. "Ooh, Giles! Making an effort here."

He was washed and combed and smelling lightly of cologne, and changed into an almost fashionable blue shirt and jacket. He wasn’t wearing his glasses either – actually, he dangled some cool un-Gilesy prescription sunglasses in his other hand. Smiling, he said, " I have, er, a luncheon date."

"For real? Does Anya know?"

Another ‘think, you stupid child’ look as the sunglasses went on: "Anya is in fact my date. We need a little time to ourselves without you lot interrupting us." But his pressure on her shoulder remained friendly, paternal, like how he always had been with Buffy and Willow. Dawn’s throat felt too tight all of a sudden.

Giles looked away. "Ah, Pablo! Come to collect your pupil?"

"Si claro," Pablo said. He tossed back his braid and then did this whole Spanish melty-smile thing. "Are you ready to learn, Dawn?"

She’d been wrong earlier, she thought as she jumped to her feet. London was more like a _squillion_ times better than Cleveland.

***

Andrew leaned out his open window and inhaled the sun-baked scent of herbs and a hint of smog. His bedroom, or what would be a real bedroom once Anya found the right labourers to finish the renovation, overlooked the back garden which the mistress of the house tended so carefully.

She was down there now, moving around like a graceful...no, ‘shadow’ wasn’t the right word....

He propped his chin on his hand and considered. The small greenhouse that last week he, Dawn, and Giles had put together – to be honest, it was mostly Giles, with swearing the likes of which Andrew had never heard outside a Guy Ritchie movie – was already filled with foliage: shimmers of normal leaves, but also strangely coloured demon-plants that Anya hadn’t yet explained to him. Even now he could see her through the glass, stripping off the blades of some pukey yucca-looking thing with her delicate gloved fingers.

Not everyone could garden in a little flip dress and heels and make it work, he thought. It took someone like her, with style and–

The doorbell shocked him out of his cataloguing. After a twitch or two, he shouted, "Someone’s at the door! I’ll get it!"

"It should be the guy to pick up the shipment," she shouted back. "I’ll be there in a second."

But Andrew was already through his half-finished bedroom and the living room he shared with Dawn. He flung open the door to what had been the servants’ quarters long ago, before any Giles owned the house, then galloped down the two flights of stairs.

When he opened the front door, he panted, "Yes. You rang?"

"Right, Jeeves," the man in brown said. "Pickup for Anya Jenkins."

"I’m Ms. Jenkins’s personal assistant.". He gestured to the waist-high stack of packages in the hall. "Here, I can help you with that."

The man said. "Not authorised to let you help carry them, lad."

"No, I–"

"Thank you, Andrew, you opened the door very well. Now let the man take the packages." Anya approached in a wave of silk and demon-plant musk. "Discount as negotiated for, Denny?"

"Yes, Anya. Just sign here," the man said.

After tossing the stalks she carried into Andrew’s hands, she signed the clipboard. "I’m paying for safe carriage and expeditious service, remember. Some of the potions could go bad if not delivered at once."

"Got it," the man said. He gingerly scooped up the packages and crunched away on the gravel walk.

Saying, "Great, I can cross that off my list," Anya went into the kitchen. Andrew hurried after her, still juggling the plant stuff which was kinda gummy. She bent over the table, rearranging her stacks of papers – "Contractor calls here; work calls here; good, Magic Box by Air shipments sent"– then, after marking something off he couldn’t see, she turned to him. "I’ll take those now."

As he released the leaves, he said, "Are these stalks Peiymon-derived?"

"Well spotted, Andrew! You’ve been reading the Compendium of Nooth-Sector Helpful Plants in between your latest comics selections." She beamed at him. "And what are Peiymon stalks used for?"

"Um, well, I, um...."

"Never mind." She slap-patted his cheek with one sticky hand, while simultaneously crushing demon yucca into an available jar with the other. "You’re making minimal progress, but every little bit counts."

"Yep. Gotta keep moving forward." He looked around the kitchen for a place to rest. Ordinarily he would have scooted up on the kitchen counter, but a mental freeze-frame – Anya’s bare legs around Giles’s waist, one of her heels digging into his back and her hands full of his bunched robe – put him off somehow. Or maybe it was the visual of Giles’s dark glare afterward.

He sat down in the nearest chair, watched Anya flutter around, and tried not to think about Giles’s many and oft displayed dark glares. Actually, Andrew found one expression of Giles’s even more disturbing; it was the white-faced, set look Giles had worn the afternoon they’d arrived, when he finally reached Buffy on the phone. Dawn and Andrew had discussed what the first, best, and still Queen Slayer possibly could have said to her erstwhile Watcher, but they didn’t know –and there was no way on this earth that Andrew would have asked. Too many glares.

"Andrew. Andrew!" Anya said, in that pointed voice that meant he’d missed at least three important instructions. She was at the sink, washing her hands. "Are you going to be all right without supervision this afternoon? No summoning of demons, or killing the innocent or even semi-innocent?"

"Of course, Anya. I have tons of constructive things to do. When Dawn gets back from her swordplay...." he trailed off. He didn’t like knives or swords any more except in selected fantasy fiction and _Highlander_ (the series, not the movies); the weapons reminded him of Sunnydale in a variety of badnesses, the hisses, the screams, oh God the blood. When she turned off the water, he blinked and said, "Anyway, where are you going?"

"I have a lunch date with Rupert. If I have any luck at all, we’ll be off somewhere having sex before dessert, which means we shouldn’t be back until later."

He tried to smile. "I’m still sorry about this morning, Anya."

"Well, you should be. We’ve provided you and Dawn with everything in your part of the house; there’s no reason you should be sneaking around to take our foodstuffs and interrupt our spontaneous expressions of love." She frowned, almost to herself, as she dried her hands. "We haven’t been able to have sex anywhere in the house except our bedroom for weeks now. I think Rupert’s beginning to find it a strain."

"Oh. Um, okay. Sorry again." Time to play assistant. "Are you expecting any messages while you’re gone? Anything you need to be called for?"

"Excellent question! No, but use your judgement." She shook out her hair, then collected her purse. "I’ll have the work phones with me, of course. And if Buffy –" the name was edged with perfect, high scorn –"calls for Giles, just take a message. She can damn well wait for him."

Boy, he really wondered what the first, best and still Queen Slayer had said to Giles that day.

***

Anya tripped down Upper Street, scanning the surroundings like a spy. It was good practice.

The neighbourhood was crowded today yet demon-free, she noted with some pleasure. The day was bright and actually summer-hot as opposed to traditional English notions of hot, so that every other restaurant or bar had a few tables out on the pavement, full of people eating and drinking and flirting. This boded well for her own afternoon.

It was so wonderful that Rupert had suggested a date. An actual date, as in going out in public and holding hands and talking, just before they found someplace private and interlocked bodies. There hadn’t been enough dating in their lives. Apocalypses and blood and annoying people always underfoot, yes; romantic dinners (or lunches) for two, no.

When she turned down a side-street, where the noise level was slightly lower, she smiled. The Almeida Brasserie was right there, as was her man, sitting at a shaded table outside and writing in his notebook.

"Honey!" she called, and he looked up with a tilt of the head and a full Rupert-smile. It made her oddly woozy with longing, as if she hadn’t seen him for days, hadn’t touched him, didn’t know exactly what he tasted like everywhere from his neck to the underside of his– Breathe, Anya, she told herself. "Am I late? I dislike being late."

"Hello, darling." He stood when she approached, then leaned over for a quick kiss. His taste was all sharp white wine and heat, and she drank in his smell, bay rum and soap and a hint of sweat. Curling her fingers around his arms, she made him kiss her harder before letting him go. After he flicked a finger through her hair, a tug she felt deep inside, he pulled out her chair for her. "You’re right on time. I finished early."

"Beat Dawn’s ass, did you?" she said, sitting down.

"Well, I won. Handily." He grinned at her as he took his own seat. "Did you get done what you needed to get done?"

"Rupert, I’ll answer the question, but here’s the deal," she announced. "We can have five minutes to talk about work, especially since we missed the Friday afternoon staff wrap-up due to our assistants’ temporary running away and then there was the pizza and sex, but after that it’s date time. No more discussion of the firm or demon-threats to the world, okay?"

Another grin, his laugh lines deepening in a way that melted her faster than the noon sun. "I think we can accomplish that. I’ll start – er, after I pour you some wine."

As he reached for the bottle of white wine resting in its cooler, she bent down and rummaged through her purse to find – yes, there they were. She pulled out the special MI5 mobile and the Giles and Jenkins mobile and set them on the table, at which sight he stopped pouring. "Anya, what the bloody hell? You said we weren’t going to be working."

"We won’t unless there’s an emergency, but I don’t want to paw through my bag and try to find them if they ring. Never mind, honey, I know your spiel: downfall of Western civilisation, no one talks to anybody face to face any more, bad manners blah blah blah."

"Well. There needs to be more vitriol associated with the ‘blah blah blah.’" He finished filling her glass, replaced the bottle, then flipped through his notes. "Right then, work. I’ve set Dawn onto the more complete and accurate Xet prophecy I extracted from Geoff Perry yesterday; next week I’ll delve further into the files I photocopied. Since Zoe still hasn’t gotten back to us regarding the followup on the clients of Cassa Dreams, that bit’s stalled – are you sure she didn’t call yesterday? No, never mind. Also, I’ve got the survey of that possibly haunted house in Croydon set up for next Thursday." He put the notebook in his jacket pocket. "That’s me done. Your turn."

First, she sipped at her wine, a cool French Viognier, slightly spicy in just the way she liked. Second, she counted on her hand, extending a finger for each point of accomplishment: "Just sent off the latest Magic Box by Air shipment; invoiced the Wandsworth people for the demon site-clearance we did; sourced the scrying mirror that Cluth the Gifted ordered, although still no joy on the whole cup-of-Xet front; got a text message this morning from Zoe, but she didn’t have any news." With a flourish, she got to her thumb: "Finally, I got a quote from the third contractor for the rest of the attic renovation, which has me considering vengeance again."

"Don’t tell me now, please. I want to be able to enjoy my lunch." He caught her hand in his, interlacing their fingers. "God, I had no idea that the work was going to be so bloody expensive."

"Seriously. We might need to shake another job loose from somewhere, since we’re sure as hell not going to get any contribution from Buffy, even though this is mostly for Dawn. Also, honey, that’s five minutes." After pressing her fingers into his, she turned and sent a smile up at the hovering waiter. "Hi there! We’ve _stopped working now_ –" Rupert smiled at her emphasis –"so menus, or specials, or –?"

Their server informed them they could call him Etienne, although if he was actually French, Anya was a Fyarl demon. After the long list of specials and dining hints was given, they ordered, and then she shooed the man away. "Thought he’d never leave," she said, as he disappeared inside.

"I know. So annoying when they want to be your friend." Rupert kissed her palm, then let go of her hand. After a sip of wine, he said, "What would you like to do after lunch? I picked up a copy of _Time Out_ ; we could go see a film, or check out a museum, or –"

"Oh, I know! There’s a monster truck exhibition at Earls Court!" She burst out laughing at his expression. "That was a joke, honey. It’s not until next week."

"Lovely. I’ll book a couple of tickets," he said, failing to hide a grimace.

"You’re so good to me." When his grimace deepened, she said, "No, _really_. You’re so good to me. I know you dislike loud, oversized machinery as entertainment, yet you’re volunteering...."

"I want you to have what you want, darling," he said, his face smoothing out. He leaned back in his chair, fingers twisting the stem of his glass, and looked at her, his shaded gaze caressing every visible inch. "Which reminds me. Just out of idle curiosity, have you ever given any thought to a safe word?"

"Oh. Oh, honey." She fought not to flush, not to moan, not to jump over the table and assault him. Instead, she smiled.

He said, in his deep, soft sex-voice, "You’re still owed something for that wonderful experience on the desk, dearest. I’ve been thinking and thinking –"

At that moment, one of their phones rang – the fucking MI5 phone. Saying "hold that thought," she grabbed at the mobile and clicked it on with some violence. "Yes, it’s Tuppence, what?"

"Hey, Tuppence. It’s...oh right. Fox here." Zoe’s work-partner Danny, she translated in her head. "There’s been some new information, and I need you and Tommy to meet with me this afternoon. Miss Carter’s busy with another crisis – human – or she’d be your handler as always –"

"Fine, sure. We’re at lunch right now. How soon do you need to meet with us?" she said.

Rupert groaned, then took a long swallow of his wine. She shrugged at him – ‘what can we do?’ –and began to listen to Danny’s instructions.

The second mobile rang. Rupert took off his sunglasses, pinched the bridge of his nose, then reached across to grab that phone. "Giles and Jenkins, Investigations and Acquisitions – oh. Hello, Jools." When she choked at the MI6 spymaster’s name, Rupert sent her a shrug that mirrored her own.

Forcing herself to concentrate, she got down the details: meet Danny in the Victoria Tower Gardens at three-thirty, second bench nearest the Thames and Lambeth Bridge. Bring something to read and drink as cover, etc etc. As soon as she could, however, she clicked off.

When Rupert saw she was off the phone, he said, "Ah. So the woman’s name is Rosemary Minton? Sorry, right, your grandmother." He mouthed, ‘Investigations job,’ then went back to listening. "Right. Holland Park – This afternoon? When? – Yes, we could just make two o’clock." Then his face tightened, a dangerous edge to his lips. "No. Absolutely unacceptable."

"What? What, honey?"

He held up a finger to her. "No, Jools, it’s antediluvian."

"What is?" she said.

"I don’t bloody care if she’s eighty-seven or a hundred and eighty-seven. We will _not_ pretend to be married for your grandmother."

Anya felt a sick sloshing in her stomach, in no way attributable to the Viognier, but she said, "What? And how much of a fee are we talking about?"

‘Big, but no,’ he mouthed.

She reached over and yanked the phone away. "Hello. This is Anya Jenkins. Now tell me what’s the deal."

"Hello, Anya," Jools said, arrogance oozing out of the mobile. "To recap for the slow: my grandmother, Lady Rosemary Minton, has a parcel of land which she’d like assessed for demon or spectral traces before she sells it. Woman of principle, you see. And one of those principles is that she deals only with those who uphold her rather peculiar ideals of society. A business couple like our Rupert and yourself should be joined in holy wedlock, or she won’t work with you. Not much of a New Woman, I’m afraid. But she’s offering to pay a handsome sum, which made me think of, well, you."

She swallowed hard. Rupert was gazing into his wine glass, his face closed-off in that familiar, bad way; he really didn’t want to do this, for whatever reason. Didn’t want to be married to her, she guessed, although it never bothered him when they played Tommy and Tuppence...."How much?"

When Siviter named the large number of thousands on offer, she said, "Fine. We’re hired." Then she handed the phone back. "Go ahead and make the arrangements, Rupert."

"Anya, you don’t understand," he said, catching her hand again. "It’s just not right."

"The money’s enough to start the damn attic renovation, isn’t it?"

"Yes, but – oh, sod it." He put the mobile back to his ear and said, "Fine. Two o’clock. What’s the address again?"

By the time he’d clicked off, she was in control of herself, without any threatening tears or gastric uneasiness. "So we’d better hope for quick service here, huh? Busy afternoon ahead of us."

"Right, yes." He squeezed her fingers hard enough so that she had to look at him. "So sorry about our date, darling; I’ll make it up to you somehow. And, er, about the other...I think you might have the wrong impression."

"What wrong impression would that be?" Glancing away, she said brightly, "Oh look, here comes Etienne."

"It’s not that the marriage thing bothers me, Anya. It’s the deception for money. The, er, pretence."

"Uh-huh. Doesn’t bother you when we’re, you know, spying." She whispered the last word, but it came out like a hiss.

"That’s different, for Queen and sodding Country, not for pounds and pence – but there, don’t you see, obviously the marriage part isn’t the problem at all. We do the other as it is."

"Uh-huh," she said again, pulling her hand away. Damn it, she could feel those despised tears and old aches boiling up again, hear the echoes of Xander’s protests in the months before the wedding disaster, all of which made her furious as well as hurt. "Okay, it’s settled. We have a profitable new investigations job, and we have a Queen-and-sodding-Country thing later. Fine fine fine. And if you say one more word to me right now, I’m shoving a fork in your ear."

At which point Etienne appeared, laden with plates. "Our curried chicken for the gentleman, our lovely salade nicoise for the lady," he said, putting down their food. Then he folded his hands as if in prayer. "Is there anything else I can bring for you?"

"No, thank you," Rupert said. He glared at the server until the man scurried back into the brasserie in fear for his life. Then he said, "Anya darling –"

"Fork. Ear. I’m not kidding," she said, and speared an anchovy and nipped off where its head should be.

After a long stare, he said coolly, "Whatever you want." He cut into his chicken with some force, then snapped at his first bite.

And they sat at their shaded table in silence, eating excellent food and drinking their wine, while she thought: safe word, huh. ‘Marriage’ must be Rupert’s.

***

When their cab sped through the turn off Kensington Road, gravity meant that Anya swayed against Giles’s body. She managed to keep her back straight and head turned away, however, even as his arm dropped over her shoulders to steady her. "All right, darling?"

"Um-hm." She turned her head further, so hard that he could hear the crack of muscle and joint.

Impossible woman, he thought for the hundred hundredth time. Even though the interior of the cab was broiling, he tightened his hold.

She hadn’t taken to his suggestion of meeting with Lady Rosemary alone – more baggage, he supposed. He didn’t know how to make the situation better, how to explain why the idea of posing as husband and wife this afternoon bothered him so. If he were being logical he would say that she was quite right; it didn’t make any difference, playing Tommy and Tuppence or playing Mr and Mrs Rupert Giles.

But he didn’t want to play at the latter. He needed it to be real.

Yet he worried about... everything. Disturbing their perfect equilibrium if he suggested marriage in truth; choosing the wrong moment to ask, or putting it wrong and ruining everything; worst, holding her against her will, if some day she were to truly look at him and want to leave him, a man twenty-five years older than her current body, a failed Watcher, someone who kept placing her in the most horrible situations. He wanted her to have what she wanted.

Of course the bloody woman never listened. What the fucking hell did he have to say to make her understand? Or, more to the point, what would she allow him to say?

There had been precious little talking when he’d told the cabbie to stop in Knightsbridge on the way. Boothby’s Fine Jewellery, dim, velvet dusty, yet with high-quality stones, had been at a not particularly fashionable spot just off the Brompton Road for years; Giles remembered being dragged in by his mother on several excruciating occasions in childhood. It was where she had bought his father’s ring, the one Giles still wore. It was where he’d have brought Anya if the moment were real. Funny, the tricks of London geography.

"Okay, at least you remembered the cover in time," she had snapped as she strode ahead of him: so pretty, so sodding angry. Lasering in on Boothby Junior, standing behind the counter as if in armour rather than a suit, she’d said, "Where’s your cheapest wedding band?"

"Er, we don’t have to–" Giles had begun.

She didn’t look at him. "If we’re going to tread all over your sensitive feelings for the fee for this case, Rupert, we shouldn’t waste any cash here."

"Anya, stop. You should have a nice ring in any event."

"It’s just pretend. No need to spend lots of money."

There was no way to win this one, so Giles had stepped back in the traditional pose of surrender. "You choose, darling. I’ll pay." It had been the work of five minutes; she picked a thin, unadorned band, he wrote a cheque, and after a slight struggle of wills, she allowed him to slide the ring onto her finger. Of course she then hadn’t spoken to him the rest of the way. Impossible woman.

After the taxi pulled up in front of the elegant behemoth of a house, they stepped out into the vicious heat. His mood became more dark-tinged when, instead of the requisite butler, the doorbell was answered by that arse Siviter. "Ah, Mr and Mrs Giles," Jools said. "Do come in."

Saying, "You’ve taken a new position, Jools?" Giles shepherded Anya inside the black-and-white entry.

A thud of the door behind them, shutting them in deep, stifling silence. Jools said, "I go to great lengths for my family, Rupert. You might not understand loyalty, of course. Shall we?"

"I do understand," Giles said, catching Anya’s hand and not letting her go.

They followed Jools’s trail of smoke down a hallway. As they went, Jools said, "Any more news on Roger’s murder?"

"Not really. It was connected to Pennith and the Yeangelt crew, using a spell to render Grittnak’s potion deadly, but why is unclear. It’s likely that Wyndam-Pryce was onto something; you’d know that better than we." So frustrating: it had been weeks, and they hadn’t been able to shake any more information out of their already suspect sources. "We’re still working on it, of course."

"I suddenly wonder why I recommended you to my grandmother at all," Jools said pensively. Then, in one of his seismic conversational shifts: "Well, go on, tell me how Wesley is!"

Anya said, "He’s fine – well, more accurately, he’s insane, at odds with his vampire employer, researching hell-contracts, and probably drinking heavily, but otherwise fine. But why would you want to know? I thought you’d never met him before last month."

"Old friend of the family," Jools said. He threw open a door to a fussy old lady’s room, from which additional heat pumped out like the concentrated centre of a blaze. "Ah, Grandmother, here we are. Lady Rosemary, may I present Rupert and Anya Giles, of Giles and Jenkins, Investigations and Acquisitions." He spoke their false name with a scarcely hidden malice. "You two, Lady Rosemary Minton."

He and Anya tried to greet her, but the frail, shrunken woman swaddled in shawls didn’t allow them to even finish before saying, "Now that’s what I like to see. May-November marriage, is it? I approve. Get them young, start them breeding right away – it always worked in our family. I trust you’re only employed until the baby comes, girl? Didn’t hear your name... now speak up."

It was possibly the first time he had ever seen Anya at a loss for words. But that break in the natural order only lasted for a few seconds, at which point she leaned into his embrace, fluttered her eyelashes in a completely over-the-top way, and said loudly, "I’m Anya, and yes, you’re right. But we have Rupert’s two adult children from a previous relationship living with us now, which makes it difficult. It’s significantly harder to make babies when the stepchildren are always underfoot."

Then she pinched him hard, where Lady Rosemary couldn’t see.

Over Jools’s muffled laughter, Giles said, "Yes, well, er, Lady Rosemary, your grandson said you had a job for us?"

"Yes. A site just cleared – south of the river, a state of affairs so embarrassing that it must be rectified. I didn’t even know I had it until my solicitors started going through my assets, Albert."

"Um, it’s Rupert."

Lady Rosemary ignored him in favour of tugging at the file which had got stuck in one of her shawls. Anya said, "Honey, don’t correct her. I mean, it’s not like Albert’s any worse a name than yours."

Before he could snap, Lady Rosemary said, "You’re a plain-spoken girl, Anna, of which I approve, even if I don’t approve of the skimpiness of your clothes. Man rules the home, but only so far as the wife lets him, isn’t that right?"

"That’s exactly right," Anya said sweetly. "I’ve believed that for, oh, centuries."

"Watch it, darling," Giles whispered. Clearing his throat, he said, "What are your suspicions about this site, Lady Rosemary?"

"Rumours more than suspicions, Albert. The building had been a pub for decades, the Parrot’s Tongue, but it burned down a few months ago. Throughout the years my tenants apparently often complained of noises in the cellar, nasty creatures and slime and blood and what not – my solicitors kept lowering their rent, which seemed to appease them, but too many concerns are documented here. I require a clear conscience about what I’m selling." As she held out a folder in a trembling hand, her filmy blue gaze pinned both of them. "I hate lies, don’t you?"

Giles said, "Yes, in a case like this." He opened the folder; there was at least two inches’ worth of letters clipped together. The top letter, dated 5 September 1963, indicated that some ‘slime-creature, seven foot tall and stinking with it’ had drunk half the beer, eaten the proprietor’s cat, and made advances on the barmaid. "Lady Rosemary, if we do find something–"

Anya, reading over his arm, said, "Nuyy demon, don’t you think?"

"Yes, that’s likely." He flipped to the second letter, dated 18 November 1969, where the occurrence looked more like a Blyd invasion: demon-insects, less nasty than the Nuyy but far more lethal. After he and Anya exchanged glances: " If we find a demon’s nest or some sort of portal–"

"Then you kill them or shut it down," the old woman barked, in a snap-change of attitude very like her grandson’s. "I do believe in demons, Mr and Mrs Giles. But I don’t believe they should stand in humans’ way."

At that moment Jools stepped in. "Grandmother, you’re looking a little tired. Is there any other information you have to give them?"

"Julian, you’re an officious prat and always have been," Lady Rosemary said. But Giles noticed that her lips were taking on a blue tinge. Jools went to her and found her pill jar, opened it for her. After she dry-swallowed a tablet, she said, "Still, you’re a good boy at heart. And I think our business is concluded. Albert, Anna, may I expect a report by midweek?"

Giles saw one more item in the folder, a letter of terms for the job; he called Anya’s attention to the indeed magnificent sum on offer. Eyes wide, she said, "We’ll have a preliminary to you by Wednesday afternoon at the latest, Lady Rosemary."

After saying their goodbyes, they left the old woman wheezing in her armchair, clutching at her shawls. The irregular hiss of her breathing followed them out.

Jools led the way to the door, but he paused before he opened it. "One more question about our previous discussion. Are you going to be using Wolfram and Hart resources to assist you in the Pennith case?"

"No. As Anya indicated earlier, it’s unclear how much longer Wesley will be working at Wolfram and Hart. If that’s what you’re asking," Giles said slowly.

"Why, yes, it was. How clever you can be, Rupert. That must be why I overlook your sad lack of success in detecting," Jools said. "And a good day to you, Mrs Giles. Lovely ring, by the way. Plainness suits you."

When they had escaped to the relative safety of the pavement, Anya said, "Okay, that was unpleasant. And does his obsession with Wesley strike you in any way creepy?"

"In every way, er, creepy." Giles kept a sudden horrible suspicion to himself. He could look up the records later. And anyway: "‘May-November’?"

"Yes, that old woman was blind. You’re clearly not a day over September," Anya said.

"Ah. I was hoping for August, actually. Now, darling, are you finished wreaking vengeance on me? I mean, calling Andrew my son, for fuck’s sake."

"Rupert, that was strategy, just like you’ve taught me," she said. Pulling away from his grasp, she stepped out into the street, put two fingers in her mouth, and whistled like a steam-engine; from out of nowhere, a black cab appeared. "Come on, come on. We’ve got spying to do."

Impossible darling of a woman, he thought for the hundred hundredth and first time, and followed her into the cab. As he scrambled in beside her, though, he noticed her hands playing with the new ring, sending flashes out into the heat.

***

The dim private room was silent now, yet Pennith could still hear the beat of his own unhappiness. With a nod of his head, he allowed Master Hat one last kick at the chained corpse of Geoff Perry, before saying, "A waste of my time, this one. Didn’t even make twenty-four hours, and told us nothing."

"Sorry, sir," Master Hat said. "I had no way of knowing the man wouldn’t talk."

"No, and your torture methods were impeccable. Perhaps he really didn’t know anything." Pennith hissed, the habitual way of encouraging thought when he wasn’t having to play-act at that revolting humanity. "We need another source of information."

"I’ve sent Garrison and Bixp to break into his Museum office," the cloaked figure offered.

"Do they know what to look for?"

"The basic description, a few names. And of course I’ve directed them to look for any Watcher-related files as well."

Pennith lowered himself to a chair, sank into thought. One foot dragged idly through the human’s drying blood while he hissed. "It’s frustrating that the Beresfords and Alleyns haven’t turned up in any of our searches," he said, mostly to himself. He had received excellent information from one of his tribute-givers that the couples weren’t who they seemed – although in the first moment he himself had seen the swirls of violence and knowledge around the men and one of the women, felt the pressures of other lives and other magicks – but the demon had no further details, and the intervening weeks had told them nothing. "The men had the stink of Watchers, like the old human who called on us. The one whose spell worked so perfectly."

Master Hat laughed at their shared memory; oh, the deliciousness as the man had sunk into living death, knowing yet not able to do anything. That had been a success indeed.

Pennith continued, "But my understanding is that the only Watchers left in England are the new one for the Birmingham Slayer and the adjuncts who work for the Council’s London Academy, none of whom pose any threat to our project."

Master Hat raised a gloved hand to his mouth. "Of course the impostors broke your intake chain and your weapon, which argues for some arcane knowledge or power."

"Yes. Or luck." For that alone they should be punished. With a final sibilant breath, Pennith stood. "I’d like you to revisit that particular tribute-giver. You know the one I mean."

"Shall I take the enforcers this time? I have a score to settle, and last night’s kill just made them hungrier," Master Hat said, a scrape of pleasure in his voice.

"Oh, I think so. It’s not as if he’s been a particularly profitable or willing source," Pennith said. "Do whatever you please with him."

As Master Hat swept a low bow, his cloak rippling onto the blood-soaked carpet, Pennith went to the door. It was almost time to open the club; as the old ones always said, there was more than one way to take in souls. Taking one last breath of the good death-smell, he said, "Oh, and throw this would-be Watcher trash in the river as you go."

***

 _‘I’m perfectly healthy and always have been,’ declared Mr Campion with an outraged dignity that was at least half genuine, ‘and I’ll thank you, miss, to keep your dispiriting remarks to yourself. I’m damned if I want to be rejuvenated, either,’ he added, a note of genuine resentment which he had not quite intended creeping into his voice._

 _‘Perhaps you’re sickening for something,’ she murmured with intent to comfort. ‘Come on. We shall have to remain engaged for a week or two’–_

"Anya, do you want this?"

At Rupert’s question, she looked up from her latest detective novel, which she always carried in her purse. The distraction was welcome, as somehow she wasn’t finding _The Fashion in Shrouds_ as comforting as some of the other stories she’d read. Sometimes fiction could come too close to reality, she thought. Taking the cup he held out to her, she smiled at him and said, "Thanks." A cover activity, of course – sitting on a park bench with her man, sharing a take-away iced drink.

At least it was cooler by the Thames, here on the shaded bench in the Gardens, anchored on the greensward. If she craned her neck she could just see beyond the river-wall, or could turn to see the Houses of Parliament to their left, but she didn’t feel like moving except to catch the breeze off the water. Maybe it’d blow away the sticky, uncomfortable feelings that plagued her.

Rupert put down his copy of _Time Out_ and started flipping through her book. "Oh, Margery Allingham. This is a Campion book, isn’t it?"

"That’s right." She chewed on a piece of ice, then swallowed. "Another Albert."

"Ha ha." Leaning back against the bench, he put his arm around her shoulder. "I always liked Campion – mild-mannered, slightly foolish exterior, yet with, er, a razor-keen mind underneath, right?"

"Of course you like him. You’re projecting." Ignoring his snort, she said, "So far I enjoy Amanda, his fake fiancé. She’s a quite capable woman." Then she fell silent before she started projecting too. Teasingly his free hand slid across her thigh, then dipped to capture her hand – the hand with the ring. "Honey, what are you doing?"

His thumb traced over the ring, warming the gold. "I do wish you’d chosen a nicer one," he said.

"Just stop. We’re not talking about this topic any more, Rupert." When he raised his eyebrows, she found herself saying, "If we keep talking, I’m going to get a, a, _tone_ in my voice, and I don’t want to get this tone, it...." She forced her lips shut on the thing she didn’t want to confess.

Quiet but insistent, his hazel gaze fixed on her: "It what?"

His voice and eyes somehow pulled the words out of her, the legacy of those awful months: "It’s the tone that makes men leave me."

Oh, no. The hurt in his eyes, even as he held on to her more tightly, as he moved to kiss her temple – damn it, that was why she had tried to stop herself. She knew his sensitivities, his need to be there for his loved ones, his guilt over Buffy and Willow. She knew what he’d felt when Buffy had said that thing to him _again_. Forgetting her own pain, Anya said, "No! I didn’t mean it that way, honey–"

But at that moment they heard footsteps, and Danny Hunter, who despite the heat was wearing what Anya considered to be the tightest clothes she’d ever seen on a male, human or demon, dropped down at the other end of the bench. "Hello, Beresfords, you’re bang on time."

"Hullo, Fox," Rupert said, at once all business. "What news?"

"Demon problem. Big, ugly demon found dead off Tower Bridge this morning." Danny looked away, his dark eyes narrowed against the reflection of sun on water.

"I didn’t think you guys cared about deaths in the demon community," Anya said.

"Well, since the sigil you lot’ve been working on was tattooed on the deceased’s face in blood, we thought it might be important."

"Fucking hell," Rupert muttered. "Do you have any way of identifying the demon?"

"Not my area, mate. But the demon-liaison at Scotland Yard sent this round." So swiftly that no one could have seen the move, he slipped them a photo – a dead Morq demon who was missing the top of his head. The latter was not a feature of that particular race, either.

The familiar sigil was tattooed on the corpse’s cheek, and Anya would take Danny’s word that it was blood, not ink. "The Morq don’t go in for body-decoration, of course. Was that it? No other markings?"

"That was it," Danny said. "What do you make of it?"

Adjusting his glasses, Rupert looked more closely at the picture. "The demon looks familiar, but I’m not sure how I know him. Possibly one of Nalph’s patrons? But I’m wondering about tribute, or the lack thereof. The loss of the, er, top of the head looks like a ritual killing to me."

"An ineffective way to collect accounts, if you ask me, but I think you’re right." Anya exchanged glances with him, then, thinking hard, said, "Since Nalph and Grittnak seemed so unwilling to defy the cloaked guy openly, though, something must have changed. Maybe closing down Cassa Dreams threw off the master-schedule, or got out to the demon community, or some other thing that threatens the Yeangelt plan? That could cause rebellion, and then reciprocal carnage."

"Nalph and Grittnak are compromised sources, right?" Danny said. "Which sounds so strange to say out loud."

"Oh, you’ll get used to the names! Especially if Miss Carter has to be away a lot dealing with human espionage," Anya said brightly.

"It’s not – Miss Carter is working with an internal case. A loss." Danny looked at the water again. She thought that the glitter in his eyes looked more like tears than like river-reflection.

"Tom Quinn?" Rupert said. Although Danny shot him a glance – yes, those would be tears if he weren’t a big tough male spy – he said nothing. Rupert let it go.

Apparently her partner did know when to stop asking questions sometimes, although not with his female companion. She bit down on another piece of ice to cool her sudden fresh irritation.

After a moment of silence, Danny said, "Well, I was just passing along the intel. Miss Carter didn’t think there was any high-level threat, but if you can call your... I guess ‘people’ wouldn’t be the right word...."

"We’ll contact them, although probably not today. We’re trying to protect our cover as long as we can, and too many questions too soon might rouse their suspicions," Rupert said. "By the way, is there any movement in finding the clients of Cassa Dreams?"

Danny got to his feet. "Don’t know – I’ll ask Miss Carter. Now, you two enjoy the rest of the weekend. One of us will check in tomorrow at the regular time." With a wave and a flash of very white teeth, he left them to themselves.

Rupert tightened his arm around her, brushed his lips against her forehead. Then, quietly: "It’s been a busy afternoon. I suppose we should go home."

"Yes. Who knows what Dawn and Andrew could have gotten up to," she said, not moving.

It was cooler here by the Thames, anchored on the greensward. They sat together, looking out at the water, sharp and glittering. She laid her head on his shoulder.

His thumb kept moving on her ring, warming the gold.

***

"He is too!"

"He isn’t, Dawn. You need to accept the truth, just like– "

"Andrew, you don’t know anything about anything!"

"You two, stop it at once." Sighing, Giles stepped in between the combatants. While doing the dishes after supper, Dawn and Andrew had fallen into a pointless argument about her romantic chances with her fencing instructor, which now threatened to devolve into foot-stomping and possibly hair-pulling.

Dawn glared at Andrew. "Tell him, Giles. Tell him I’m right."

"Giles, you know Pablo doesn’t– " Andrew began.

"You couldn’t pay me to enter this conversation. Just take it upstairs if you’re going to embark on violence."

Anya walked in from the living room, turning a page in her book. Without looking up, she said, "What Rupert said. Dishes cost money, you know, and you two sound like you’re about to start destroying the china."

"Oh sure, the parental types always stick together," Dawn muttered. "And I think I just weirded myself out."

"Upstairs, or elsewhere." Giles pointed to the hallway in his best patriarch fashion, which he devoutly hoped worked better with these two than it had ever done with the Scoobies. "I’ll finish the dishes."

"We’ll finish," Anya corrected.

Dawn looked significantly at Andrew, who nodded, before she said in a sudden rush of enthusiasm, "Oh Giles, you’re the best!" and hugged him. Although Andrew seemed inclined to follow her example, a stiff arm to the shoulder prevented it.

"Hey, what about me?" Anya said. "I’ve just expressed my own willingness to take over your chore."

"Don’t worry, darling, I strongly suspect that this affection means she wants something. What is it, Dawn?"

"Really, Giles!" She gave him a squeeze, then grinned at him. "Um, could you float us a loan if we wanted to go to the pub? Our Forbidden Planet raid means we’re sort of tapped out till next week."

"At least she’s asking, rather than stealing," Anya observed. "And Bradley’s on duty at the Moon under Water tonight. He’ll ensure good behaviour."

"True enough." Giles got out his wallet. Even as he handed over a ten-pound note: "Here’s enough for a couple of ciders at the Moon under Water. However, I need your promise not to get into trouble."

"On our word as Junior Watchers," the two of them chirped, hands on hearts. He forced himself not to wince. Too much.

"Okay, Junior Watchers. Come with me, I have words of wisdom to impart," Anya said. She collared them both and dragged them out into the hallway. Although he tried, he couldn’t make out exactly what she was saying or their replies.

Sighing again, he rolled up his sleeves and set to work. Nothing about the day had turned out right: ruined date, angry lover, enforced contact with Siviter, more complications in the already baffling Yeangelt mess. And now he was doing dishes. Sodding perfect Saturday.

He was putting the last dish on the draining board when he heard the front door shut. Anya padded back into the kitchen, the smile on her face fading when she saw what he was doing. "Honey, I was going to help!"

"‘s fine, I’ve taken care of it. Let’s just let them dry naturally." He finished wiping his hands, then tossed the towel on top of the washing-up liquid.

"Okay." She reached up on tiptoe and kissed him, a fleeting touch that left him wanting more. "Do you have any plans for tonight?"

"No, I’ve done what I could with our new intel and our new case, caught up on the Cleveland and L.A. e-mail. Buffy’s going to call tomorrow." Repressing the involuntary choke of guilt, he smiled down at her. "What would you like to do, darling?"

"I want to stay home, especially since it’s just us for once." She linked her fingers in his belt-loops, then rested her head against his chest. Maybe she had forgiven him, he thought. The way she was melting into him certainly seemed like forgiveness – "What’s on TV, do you know?"

Or maybe she hadn’t. "I have no idea. But um, did you ever watch the _Junkyard Wars_ I taped for you this week? You know, when you took Dawn to meet Zoe?"

" _You_ taped my show for me, honey?"

He hated to destroy her awed surprise, but: "Well, strictly speaking, no. Andrew did when I asked him. Seemed safest, after that unpleasant incident earlier when I, er, tried to tape the cricket and ended up with _Porn, the Musical._ Nevertheless, there are a couple of episodes on tape for you."

"You’re so good to me." Her voice was a little too shaky for his liking, her eyes too bright, but her mouth on his stopped all thought. After a long, long kiss, she pulled away. In a soft chime, she said, "Are you going to watch too? Or at least sit in the living room with me?"

He followed the curve of her cheekbone with his finger. "I’ll sit in the room with you while that bloody machinery grinds away onscreen. But I might bring a book to read."

"Hurry," she said.

When he went upstairs to find something, however, he found his steps slowing on a wave of nerves. He didn’t know what to do, she still hadn’t let him talk to her about the wrong impression, he felt the press of failure all around. And it was so sodding stuffy in the house. He forced himself to take a minute to breathe.

He didn’t fancy reading anything too serious tonight, so instead of turning into the study, he went into their bedroom. Anya kept her growing stack of mysteries there, in a bookcase they’d found in Camden Market. She swore it was an antique, although he was equally sure it wasn’t. Smiling, he ran his fingers along the top shelf, then bent down to inspect its contents. Yes, he thought he’d seen it in her recent haul: another Allingham, _Traitor’s Purse_.

He scanned the copy on the cover as he went back downstairs. ‘The tale of a man totally unable to recall his own identity....’ That wasn’t his problem, he thought. He knew all too well who he was. Almost without volition he covered the bolded ‘Traitor’ on the cover. He didn’t want to remember the last time he’d heard the word.

Shaking off the bad memories, he stepped off the staircase. Anya had finally lit the entryway candles, which she hadn’t done when they’d come home from their afternoon out. Maybe she had forgiven him–

He stopped in his tracks in the archway leading to the lounge. Candles were lit on every table, flickers of yellow and blue cutting through the dusk. Anya’s stupid programme flickered too, images of spare parts and teamwork and rebuilding, but the sound was turned off. All he could hear was his own harsh breathing as he looked, finally, at her. At his Anya.

Wearing only her lingerie, she reclined on a sheet she’d spread on the floor. She smiled at him, then dipped her fingers into a glass of ice she’d placed nearby, brought the ice cube to her lips. After a lick, she said, "It’s extremely hot, honey. Aren’t you wearing too many clothes?"

"Er. Yes." Jesus Christ. He pulled his shirt off, threw it he didn’t give a fuck where. Then his hands went to his trousers – but he stopped, distracted by her taking the ice cube and sliding it down between her breasts– "Darling, wait. I’ll do that for you."

"You’re so good to me," she said, a laugh underneath her words.

"I try, dearest. I do." He stripped off the rest of his clothes, then came to kneel by her. Her hand came to him, wrapped him up, stroked – he jolted at the sensation of cold against hot, melting liquid against stirring hardness. When she smiled wider, he said, "Seriously, let me handle the ice."

Then he leapt.

With a squeak, she arched up hard against his body, the silk of her lingerie sliding over his length. When he dropped down over her, letting gravity do the work, her thighs spread to cradle him. She whispered, "I left my underwear on so you could tear it off me. I’ve kind of missed the roughness, what with the somewhat restricted sex life we’ve had, and I do have the losses budgeted."

A kiss, long and deep, tasting of ice and steam and her own sweet sharpness, as he pressed himself against her. It was all friction and rough silk, but – "Don’t be impatient, darling." Then he reached for the ice. Although the cubes were slippery, he held tight as he brought them to her breasts. At the first touch of ice to her nipples, she moaned, a breath that made the flames around them waver. Snap-quick, she brought her legs around him, as she had that morning in the kitchen, and he sank down deeper into her hold.

Still teasing her with the ice, ever-decreasing circles over those sensitive points, he said, "How much time do we have before they come back?"

"Unless you’ve taught them the ward Willow just taught me, we’ve got until we let them in – oh God, honey!"

"Not enough. Never enough time with you," he said, just before his lips caught at her breast, sucking in the ice and steam and perfect Anya-ness.

In some dim recess of his mind, he noted that she hadn’t taken off the pretend wedding ring.

***

The bell tolled through his home, harsh and unforgiving. There wouldn’t be an escape this time.

His rags fluttering in the night-heat, Grittnak took one more look around his Greenwich rooftop. He could see in the dark. His last look, he thought.

But it wasn’t full dark yet. The stars were coming out, a complement to the light from the human civilisation all around, shining on the demon-plants and insect life he had tended so carefully. At a ripple and a glitter in the corner, he realised where he could put the information.

After scrawling a name – Robert Gordon – on the envelope he held, he hurried to the laceprig web in the corner. There was a small cubbyhole just behind it; he shoved the envelope inside. Only the tiniest strip of white revealed what was hidden.

He had barely enough time to go back to the bench and sink down before the creatures made their way up the stairs. Yet he held his head high.

Even the son of a Nazgut could understand friendship and loyalty, and his death would show it.


	2. Chapter 2

Anya woke on a panicked breath. Rupert had just moaned in her ear, and not in a good way.

She took stock. Because they hadn’t fully drawn the curtains last night, a blade of early sun sliced across their bed. It was already hot, too, and his body crowding into hers radiated even more furnace-warmth. The bed-hog had kicked off all his covers and most of hers in his staking of territory, which at the moment she didn’t mind, and his face was half-buried in _her_ pillow. What she did mind was the way the muscles of his broad back shivered and the way his breathing sounded like pain.

"Honey?" she said, her hand going to him to ease, maybe to push his bad dreams away –

The phone rang.

And then another phone rang, sharper and more alarming.

Putting aside the impulse to soothe, she slapped him on the back. "Rupert, phone. It’s on your side."

One more full-body shudder, then he said, as if he’d been awake for hours, "Er, right." Without opening his eyes, he rolled over, fumbled for the receiver on his bedside table.

She looked around for the other one – the MI5 phone, she realised with a sinking feeling. With a long stretch to her own night stand, she grabbed it. Clicking on their phones at the same time, together they said, "Yes?"

On her line Zoe said, "Tuppence, sorry for the early Sunday call. We’ve got some work for you; a demon death, this time one of Tommy’s informants. We’re in a terror campaign, I’m afraid."

"Was it Nalph?" she said.

Rupert cast a quick glance at her, then said into his phone, "Sorry, Wood, I missed that. What did you say?"

Zoe said in Anya’s ear, "No, it was the Greenwich contact, Grittnak. He was found off the Deptford docks early this morning. Same sigil-tattoo and missing body part as yesterday’s demon."

"Oh, that’s so not good." Her hand went out to Rupert, who slid over in the bed in order to catch hold of her. His jaw had tensed in a way that alarmed her, but no time – she said to Zoe, "Do you want us to look at the body or something?"

His fingers interlaced with hers. "Go on," he said to either Wood or to her, she couldn’t tell.

Zoe said, "Later, possibly, but we’d like you to check out the informant’s home today. Neither the Yard nor our people feel comfortable enough, or know what to look for...."

A thud rattled the ceiling. A muffled noise, then one more thud. Anya sighed; Andrew must be awake, as graceful as ever.

After she told Zoe that they’d go investigate that morning and report back, she hung up and tossed the spy phone on the night stand.

Rupert was saying, "Right. But no markings on the body? – Other than that, nothing? – Yes, we’ll take care, and if we find out anything, we’ll let you know. Speak to you later."

He put his receiver back on his table, then tugged on their linked hands and pulled her over him. Their sweat-dampened, naked bodies flowed together, slippery and twisty, until she planted her hands on either side of his head and braced herself. A beard-burn kiss, morning-sour, more sweet, before he said, "Hello, darling. What’s happened?"

"Morning, honey." She kissed him again, just because, then said, "That was Zoe. Grittnak was found dead, a ritual killing just like the Morq; she wants us to go to Greenwich to check out his place. So what did Wood want?"

"Oh. That’s....where was he?"

"River, like the other one," she said. "Again, what did Wood want?"

His hand came to cradle her cheek, although she didn’t know which one of them it was intended to soothe. "He called to tell me of a Watcher’s death. Young Geoff Perry, the archivist at the Museum whom I met with on Friday."

"You didn’t tell me he was a Watcher!"

"Didn’t I? Well, his appointment hadn’t been officially confirmed, but he was in. He applied when Robson put out the word a couple of months ago." She eased down on his chest, resting her head on his shoulder. They both knew Robson had stepped up the recruitment after Rupert had told him they were leaving; she figured this murder unfortunately was not only a tragedy but also a trigger for Rupert’s over-active guilt. After he brushed a whiskery kiss on her forehead, he continued, "Anyway, his body was found chained and beaten, also in the Thames. The boy didn’t have any family, so Cleveland got the call."

"It couldn’t be just a random murder? London has all kinds of crooks and bad guys, and in my experience the river has always served as a sort of collection point for all the bodies – okay, never mind. Do you think it was demon-related? Yeangelt-related?"

Above them came another thud, then a Dawn-shriek. Nobody in the multiverse could squeal like the younger Summers. Rupert ignored the noise, however, in favour of his hand stroking up her spine. "Yes. Busy night for the demons, apparently."

"‘London is changing, in ways surface and deep,’" she quoted. Sliding up so that she could hold his gaze with hers, she said, "Honey, are you okay?"

"I’m fine." The liar – he glanced away into the sunlight as he spoke.

"Really. Because even before all the murder-announcement phone calls, you seemed to having a nasty dream."

As he pressed his fingertips into her back, massaging in that way he had, she could feel a little tremor. All he said, though, was "Busy night for all sorts of demons. Don’t let it worry you, darling."

"You don’t think that you can get away with a cryptic statement like that, do you –"

"Yes, I do." Lifting, he caught her mouth with his. A deep kiss this time, pain and pleasure and a bite of desperation, before he fell back against the pillows. Then he smiled. "We should get ready for our investigation. Do you want to take your shower first?"

She could have cheerfully hit him for the evasion. However, a smack was often her opening move in those tricky discussions of his most private feelings, for which they didn’t have time at the moment. "No, honey, I’ll wait for you."

After one last kiss, he slid out from under her and headed into the bathroom. Once the door shut, she grabbed one of his shoes off the floor and threw it at the ceiling, where overhead Andrew and Dawn now were imitating a herd of Mykin demons, all big feet and bellows. "Hey, you guys!" she shouted. "We have to go to Greenwich for a work thing! Do you want to assist?"

There was a moment of silence, broken first by the water going on in the master bathroom, and then by twin shouts of "Yes!" and two sets of footsteps above pounding off in separate directions to their rooms.

Sighing, she crawled back on the bed. Rupert never took very long in the shower; she would just lie there and rest for a few moments. Her arms went around the pillow they had shared – she could still feel the dampness, the mingled heat from them both – and her hands locked to hold in her nerves and her property. The thin gold ring she’d forgotten to take off last night was already slippery on her finger.

It was going to be even hotter today. Yet she shivered, just like he had done.

***

A lack of air-conditioning made summer car rides kind of icky, Andrew thought; luckily they were almost there. His window was down as far as it would go, and the hot wind felt heavy, like rocket afterburn on his face. He stopped thinking about rockets, though, because that way lay memories of Warren and Jonathan, emptiness and blood.

The heat didn’t seem to bother Dawn, sitting next to him. Her hair was tied back in a complicated braid (at which he’d assisted, although she never would agree to try Leia’s hairdo from Episode Four) that lifted in the wind. Slurping on a Diet Coke, she also played with her pen, doodling on her Watcher-in-training notebook before the big task. Giles had asked her to be responsible for writing down his observations.

Andrew’s grasp tightened on his Giles and Jenkins PDA and his own job. Anya, beaming over the breakfast table, had told him that since the dead demon had cultivated plants and insects, he and she would be the ones investigating that area. "If anything is left, that is," she’d faltered, smile dying. Giles, who’d been making toast, came up behind her and put his hands on her shoulders, dropped a kiss on her hair; although he hadn’t said anything, it didn’t seem to matter. Her smile came right back.

He looked toward the front seat. No smiles now, he thought. Giles drove, Anya sat on the passenger side, and between them Andrew could practically see the tension. He guessed it wasn’t from the CD thing – when they got in the car, Giles had put in some mournful English-guy rock music, Anya had hit Eject and substituted a Motown mix with special emphasis on Diana Ross, and the resulting discussion of car-stereo etiquette and appropriate music for work had lasted from Islington to London Bridge. After that, Giles had turned off the music altogether. But Andrew had heard enough parental fights to know that surface disagreement could point to deeper problems.

Yeah, Tucker’s brother knew all about that.

He looked back out the window. The car was turning onto a street that was almost hidden to the casual eye, kind of like a more accessible Diagon Alley. Andrew squinted at the sign flashing by – Demon Street. Crooked houses shimmered by in the heat as the Saab jolted up the lane.

And oh man, there was a small pack of Romut demons, many-clawed creatures he’d once thought about summoning but was too frightened of to do so, hovering by the railings of the most decrepit house. "Um, Giles, those demons–?"

"We’ll get past them," he said shortly, pulling into a parking spot in front of the house.

Anya turned around and smiled at them. "Let me and Rupert handle this, okay? We’ll instruct you on tactics later."

"No argument from me," Dawn said.

After Giles and Anya had a brief, low-voiced discussion and Anya rummaged around in the bag she carried, the two lead investigators got out. As their doors shut in unison, Dawn whispered, "I wish I knew more what to expect. Maybe we should start reading Anya’s mysteries."

"Yeah, or find a good RPG manual for detective-spies," Andrew said. Then he stuck his head out the window to watch and learn.

Giles, hand outstretched, went first. He nodded to the three demons who blocked the gate and said, "A friend of the dead, come to seek entrance."

Anya stepped up beside him, holding out a packet to the Romuts. The demons barked at it. She clicked her teeth five times – a signal of good faith, Andrew vaguely remembered – then shrieked, so loud that the stones rang with the sound.

After the demons exchanged glances and clicks of their own, the tallest and most claw-happy shrieked back even louder. Giles and Anya bowed, before Giles put his own hand on Anya’s – funny, Anya was wearing a ring that Andrew had never noticed before – and they extended the packet once more. The tallest demon grabbed it, sniffed, then clicked five times.

"Come on, you two," Anya said.

They were out of the car in a second, treading on Giles’s and Anya’s heels so as not to be left behind or made into Romut snacks. As the demons tore into the package with pleased growls, Giles opened the gate and then ushered everyone up the walk. Dawn asked quietly, "Hey, Giles, what was in that?"

"Smoked salmon," he said.

Anya said, "It really should be Tk-Tk cod with a garnish of bitterdeath root and sage, but salmon was all we had in the pantry. Since Rupert had noticed the neighbourhood Romuts on his last visit, we prepared for the ritual greeting."

"I’ll enter that in the records, Anya," Andrew said, nodding.

Dawn said, "This demon-negotiation thing takes some getting used to. In Sunnydale it was usually just smash-bash-dead-demon."

"That technique works well for Slayers, Dawn, not for Watchers," Giles said. "We– er, _you’re_ different." Out of the corner of his eye Andrew saw Anya slip her free hand into Giles’s for some reason.

When they reached the broken open door, Giles held them back for a second. After he tested the threshold with his bag, he said, "The wards are gone. They must have...never mind. We can safely go in."

It was hotter, stuffier, inside. The entry stank with blood, a long scrape of it discolouring the bottom of the staircase, and Andrew put his hand over his nose. Giles said, "Be careful, all of you. Dawn, you and I will check out Grittnak’s indoor office first. Anya –"

"Yep, Andrew and I have the rooftop. Come up when you’re done, though, honey." After a quick squeeze, she released Giles’s hand, then threw Andrew a smile. "Up we go!"

The rooftop was like nothing he had ever seen. The collection of demon-plants would have made Anya’s greenhouse seem suburban and ordinary, if it weren’t for the devastation: crushed or ripped plants in unearthly colours; pot shards everywhere; three cages of broken demon-insects with small, random buzzes from their corners. She said, "Oh, this is terrible. So much waste – and where did the boium tree go?"

"The boium tree? Oh, that’s–"

"Yes, a large plant with highly volatile leaves, especially when mixed with certain demons’ blood. The Yeangelt gang had ordered Grittnak to give its leaves as tribute, then used it to murder people. They must have taken the whole tree." She rubbed her arms as if she were cold, but said, "Okay. Let’s put on our gloves and get going."

They worked their way from the south end to the north: she identified plant and insect remains and searched for clues (other than Grittnak’s blood, spatters of which were everywhere and made Andrew’s stomach hurt), while he entered and cross-referenced the findings. Several times she made little whimpers at a piece of destruction, then carefully picked up a leaf or a cutting to put into her sack. The last time she said, "It’s criminal to let these specimens die. It’s criminal. Which is obvious because they’re an evil demon gang, but it really bothers me."

"We’ll be planting later?" he said.

"Yes. We have to rescue what we can." Then she turned toward the corner and gasped. "The laceprigs! Oh, the laceprigs and the Kizzyoits, oh Andrew...." Falling on her knees, she stretched out a hand to a tattered web of something-something. A few black flecks hung on the ripped shreds; the smushed bodies of two pixie-like demons, each of which looked like a cross between Tinkerbell and a squirrel with really big teeth, lay underneath. She dug in the supply-sack for a jar.

Laceprigs were important somehow, but he couldn’t remember – "What about them?"

"Rupert and I were harvesting on the night we became a couple; it’s like they helped us get together. Also, the Sleep-More potion which has them as a base ingredient is a big seller," she said. Carefully she took several of the black flecks off the web and dropped them into the jar, then added some of the web and the surrounding earth, sifting it through her fingers. As she screwed the lid back on, though, she said, "Hey. Hey, what’s that?"

Although he hadn’t seen what she was looking at, he could see the dirt-encrusted envelope she pulled out from behind the ruined web. "What’s it say?" he asked, craning over her shoulder.

From behind them came the sound of footsteps and Dawn’s "Wow, this is totally wrecked."

When Andrew turned around, Giles was standing in the middle of the garden, squinting against the sun. He looked upset, although trying to maintain Gilesian cool: "Darling, what did you – oh, the laceprigs."

"Yes, I don’t know if any can be saved," she said. "But see what I found, Rupert."

Andrew shifted back enough to let Giles pass, then bend down by Anya. That was Dawn’s cue to hurry over to join him and say in his ear, "We discovered some clue-age about how long the tribute’s been demanded, but Giles also found twenty years’ worth of letters between him and Grittnak. The demon-guy had been saving them all this time? Anyway, Giles got all silent and stabbed-to-the-heart about it."

"You mean, like that?" Andrew said.

Fallen to his knees, staring at the envelope, Giles looked like someone had just light-sabered him. " _Robert Gordon_. Bloody hell," he said, ripping it open.

"Who’s Robert – good grief, is that another one of your aliases? It’d be helpful if you’d give me a damn list sometime," Anya snapped. But she pulled off her gloves in order to rest her hand on Giles’s back.

"Yes, it’s what Grittnak called me," Giles said. "He left this for me. He must have – Christ, he must have known they were coming for him."

"Oh, honey." She threw her arms around him.

His hand covered hers, even as he read the paper he’d pulled out. "Not much here. _Beresfords only_....maybe he means that Pennith doesn’t know who we really are. _The cup stays in the family. Cursed gold from the furthest fires, from the west, opens one and three._ "

"‘Cursed gold from the furthest fires?" Anya said. "That could be a couple of different dimensions, although ‘the west’ also suggests human-make. Huh. Andrew, we’ll start looking tomorrow."

"Got it," Andrew said. As always he felt a weird little thrill at her use of ‘we.’ Bending his head, he entered the words, murmuring them under his breath.

But Dawn said, "Um, Giles? Are you okay?"

"Honey?" Anya said, more loudly.

Giles was staring at the paper. " _Griffin Hartman_. Of course. Well, at least that’s not in sodding code." With a harsh exhalation, he shook off Anya’s arms and got to his feet, then helped her up. "What mobiles did we bring?"

"The Beresford one and the private line, why?" Anya said. "Stop being a spy for a second and talk to me."

Without answering, he opened her purse and got out the MI5-phone, placed a call. After several seconds: "Miss Carter? – Yes, Tommy here. If I make a business appointment in Brixton tonight, could we have backup?"

"Rupert, seriously, what is it?" Anya said, poking him in the side.

Giles coughed, then said into the receiver: "Actually, I’ll be going in alone, but I’d like people close, to watch with Tuppence – Right. Er, I’ll call you back in a minute." Then he tossed the phone to her.

Andrew caught Dawn’s arm, whispering, "Oh, this could be bad."

"Yeah. Run, run away," Dawn said. They sidled to the furthest edge of the roof.

Anya crowded Giles, going up on her toes to get in his face. "Rupert Giles, what do you think you’re doing? Planning some stupid scheme, talking about going alone into where the hell ever? And who or what is Griffin Hartman?" Yikes, Andrew thought, that shrill blast was the true voice of a millennium-old vengeance demon. It made him gulp and edge further back, and he wasn’t even her target.

Giles, however, seemed unfazed; he was busy fishing in his shirt pocket, then pulling out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. Since when did he smoke? "Tell you in a minute, Anya. I need the other phone."

"Well, you’re not getting the other one until – Rupert, for God’s sake!"

Somehow Giles managed to light a cigarette and reach in to steal the other mobile out of her purse at the same time. Either his dexterity or his ignoring her anger acted like a stun-gun, because she went quiet and still, staring at him.

Turning his back on them all, he exhaled smoke, did something slouchy and un-Gilesy to his spine, then clicked on the phone. After seeming to search his memory for something, he punched in a sequence, took another drag on his cigarette. A breath or two, then, in a tough-London-guy accent Andrew had never heard before: "Hey. I need an appointment with the Griffin for tonight. – Yeah, a change to an old tattoo. A Special." He gave a dark, rolling laugh, one that made Andrew’s stomach hurt like the scent of blood. "‘Course I got it there, mate, why the fuck else would I call? Not every would-be sorcerer sod can do the real magicks, yeah, and I need the magicks."

Saying quietly, "Oh, I get it. And I’m hating this already," Anya went to Giles’s side. Andrew didn’t know why she curled her hand around Giles’s bicep, why he flinched at her touch.

Another puff of smoke, white against burning blue sky. Giles said, "Yeah. Just say it’s Ripper."

***

When the figures on the screen fell in pixels of blood and death, Andrew groaned. "That wasn’t supposed to happen!"

"Sorry, you killed ‘em good," Dawn said, patting his shoulders. "Maybe you’ll do better at protecting them next time. You know, if you actually think about what you’re doing."

"Being a hero’s really hard work," he said with a lame attempt at sarcasm. Then he smiled. "But that’s okay. Do you want to take your turn now?"

"Not this second, because it’s almost time for Buffy to call. I’m going to go wait downstairs."

"Urg. Better you than me, " he said, as he reset his game. "It’s kinda foreign-film down there – and not the good chopsocky kind."

He wasn’t wrong, she thought as she started downstairs. It had been a weird ride home from Greenwich, with Anya trying to talk to Giles and Giles barely answering; when he had finally put on her Motown CD, she’d covered her mouth with her fingers and gazed out the window for the rest of the trip. The sun had really bounced off that new ring Anya was wearing, Dawn thought.

When she hit the first-floor landing, she actually could feel the floor tremble from the music Giles was playing in the study. He’d gone upstairs after lunch, saying something about emailing Willow and Wes and planning the evening work, yadda yadda, but the guitars and blues vocalist had cranked up right after that. When Anya had heard the first notes, she had picked up the plant stuff from Grittnak’s and stomped out to the back garden.

As Dawn came down the last flight of stairs, however, Anya stood at the entryway table, bringing candles out of a sack. "Hello, Dawn," she said without looking up.

"Whatcha doing?"

"Replacing the candles, obviously." After collecting the dead ends of the beeswax pillars currently in use, she tossed them in the sack. Then she placed a fresh pillar on each of the four holders – two big ones in the front, a smaller one to each side – murmuring something with each movement. Next, she got the candle-lighter out and touched flame to each wick, murmuring again.

"I’ve been wondering – are you doing a protection spell or something?" Dawn asked.

"Close enough. A wish." Apparently thinking that was enough of an answer, she scooped everything into the sack and headed into the kitchen. Over her shoulder, she said, "Waiting for Buffy?"

"Yeah." She followed Anya in. "Do you think I should go get Giles, so he can talk to her too?"

"I don’t think he needs more harassment – " Anya began, just as the music overhead stopped. With a snap, she threw the sack into a cupboard. "Never mind. That man’s a glutton for punishment."

"Come on, Anya! Why shouldn’t he talk to her?" Dawn said. But when Anya stared at her, she hesitated. "I know it might be...but Buffy’s just trying to... see, it’s hard for her."

"Agreed. And it’s not difficult for anyone else?" Anya crossed her arms, frowning in a vengeance-y way.

But here was Dawn’s chance. "Please tell me – what did Buffy say to him? You know, that day?"

"You’d have to ask your sister." After a hum of discomfort, she came over and gave an Anya-hug, awkward yet kind. "However, you should know that even though it’s inconvenient and very expensive and not at all the way Rupert and I planned our new life, we really don’t mind having you and Andrew living with us." A harder squeeze. "Well, you specifically. And since Rupert hasn’t threatened to kill Andrew in over a week, I think we’re safe there as well."

"Simply an oversight on my part," Giles said from the doorway – which made Dawn jump, she hadn’t heard him come down the stairs. Smiling a little, he put his arms around them both in a fleeting British-guy embrace. "But yes, we’re happy to have you here."

Luckily the phone rang at that moment, or she would have started crying or something, which would have been extremely uncool. She said, "I’ll get it. You guys come in when you want, I’ll put it on speaker."

After sprinting across the hall, she picked up the phone and said, "Giles Jenkins Summers Wells residence."

"Hey, Dawnie." After she pressed a button, Buffy’s voice was loud and clear, filling the living room. "Just thought I’d check in per the schedule. I guess Giles gave you the message?"

"Duh, hence my speedy answering the phone. And also, hey back." She fell into the nearest chair. "So where are you, and why can’t you email me with the information regarding phone check-ins?"

"I’m in Romania on a Slayer job. Haven’t seen Dracula yet, though I ‘ve been looking double-close at every bat. And I emailed Giles because you didn’t answer my last messages."

"Oh. Yeah, that." She gestured at Giles and Anya, who hovered in the archway. "Sorry, I got busy. ‘Cause first I had a meeting at the academy, a sort of get-to-know-your-tutors party, and then we’ve been doing eighty million work things, and Anya took me out for this great Indian meal with Zoe, who’s one of their colleagues–"

"Don’t forget the unapproved running off to Forbidden Planet with Andrew," Anya said. Grabbing Giles’s free hand, the one not holding a bottle of water, she pulled him to the couch.

"Not to mention your fencing lessons," Giles said as they sat down. "And hello, Buffy. How are you?"

"Oh. Hi, you guys," Buffy said. Even miles of distance couldn’t disguise the lack of enthusiasm. "Sounds busy-busy. And you’re letting Dawn run around without supervision, huh?"

"You missed both the ‘unapproved’ and ‘completely harmless comic-book store’ thing," Dawn said. "But hey, I made up for it, I worked like a good little girl on some prophecies. Giles is a stern taskmaster, you know."

"Yes," Buffy said. She didn’t say anything else.

When he shifted uneasily, Anya put her hand on his leg and said, "We do look out for Dawn, Buffy, but she’s a junior Watcher. She’s got to be allowed to go out on her own."

"Yeah, I remember that was always Giles’s thing. Do it for yourself, stand on your own, think of the mission, whatever." Buffy’s voice was scary-sweet. "But part of the whole living-in-London deal is that you guys are responsible for her. She’s not a Slayer, she doesn’t have to make the same choices I did."

"No, you’re quite right," Giles said. "We’ll try harder to, er, guard her, if that’s your wish. But, as Anya says, Dawn’s going to be a Watcher. It does necessitate some harsh...knowledge." He looked down, wrapped his fingers more tightly around his bottle of Tynant Blue. Quietly: "I’ll do my best to keep her safe, while she learns what she needs."

"Let’s emphasize the ‘keep her safe,’ and less of the ‘do my best,’ okay? Based on my own experience of your best," Buffy said. "Besides, you’re not a Watcher any more –"

"You’re quite right, of course," Giles said again, in a very different tone. "Thank you for your instructions, Buffy. Take care of yourself, and I’ll leave you to talk to Dawn now." Giving her a tight smile, so painful that she wished he wouldn’t, he got up and left.

"A damn glutton for punishment," Anya muttered, before saying sharply, "Buffy, your crap stops now. Whatever past history bothers you, you let it go before you call here. I’m not letting you talk to him that way again."

"You’re ‘not letting’–"

"That’s what I said. You at least _pretend_ to respect Rupert, or you’re not going to speak to him again, I don’t care how much he misses you." Anya slammed off the couch, said "Dawn, talk as long as you want," then went after him. It sounded like her heels were spiking through the floorboards.

"Smooth, Buffy, really smooth," Dawn said. "Do you want to screw up everything for me like you’ve screwed it up for yourself?"

"That’s not fair. Besides, he always leaves just when – "

"It is _so_ fair. Look, do you even get how much Giles and Anya have done for me? How happy I am, how much I’m learning?" She thought of their fencing bouts, and how that morning in Grittnak’s office Giles had not only given her notes but asked her opinion. "I’ve found my place, and it’s not just trailing after you. Why do you want to mess this up?"

"Dawn, I don’t. I let you go." Her voice was small, not like the Queen Slayer. "I let you go when you asked me."

"And I’m grateful, and I love you. You know that, right? I love you. But you don’t have to pretend to be Mom any more, okay. Just be my sister." Whoa, she hadn’t even known that was going to come out of her mouth. At the muffled chokes coming through the speaker, she added, "Oh, nice. You always snort like a pig when you cry."

"Bitch," Buffy said, half-laughing, half-not. "It’s more complicated than that, things you don’t understand –"

"Yeah, it probably is, but that doesn’t matter. You fix what you need to, or hold whatever grudge you need to, but be cool when you phone us. I mean, I don’t expect you’ll ever come visit–?" The silence at the other end confirmed it. Slayers were so stubborn. "Okay, whatever. Now tell me about your exciting business trip to Romania. Are you hunting the big Drac, or looking for new Slayers, or what?"

"You’re being awfully grown-up and Watchery. I think I hate it," Buffy said. But then she went on to talk about Romania and a new Slayer, Dracula and a very cute pair of shoes she’d found in Mexico City on her last trip, and made arrangements to call more often.

It wasn’t until Buffy had hung up that Dawn remembered she was going to ask about Spike and if there’d been contact. Still, there was always next time.

She got up and stretched, then found herself wondering where Giles and Anya had gone. She was a little worried about them. Somewhere in the back of her mind she remembered hearing the back door shut.

Padding through the hall, she went past the ground-floor guest room and Anya’s potions-and-packaging room, which in some previous house incarnation had been the dining room. At the good magic and murmurous voices hanging in the hot afternoon air, she smiled. One of the French doors had swung open; she peeked through first, as it was a good idea to check before barging in on them. It saved on eye-burning moments.

Giles was sitting in one of the deck chairs on the brick patio, with Anya curled up on his lap despite the heat. They were holding hands, a simple link of fingers that for no reason made Dawn feel a little weepy again. Through the open door she could just hear Anya: "...got to talk to me. It’s not healthy for you to repress all this."

"I know. And I do try, darling," he said.

"Okay then. We have a great deal to argue about, including this Ripper nonsense, but let’s start with this morning when you lied to me about your nightmare –"

"No, I didn’t."

"You didn’t answer my question, which counts as a lie for the purposes of this discussion, and if you call it strategy, you’re getting punched in the stomach. Now go."

A sharp, small laugh, a glance away at the herb garden, before he said, "My nightmare. Right. Er...."

"No stalling, Rupert." Dawn didn’t think a command would work, and in fact Anya immediately added "please?"

"Right. Er, well, in the dream you’d left me. Alone. Cold."

"I’d left you? Honey, that’s crazy talk."

"Perhaps. But you had done, and I was freezing to death." He said it so matter-of-factly, Dawn thought, like he’d say ‘The best source for that demon identification is in Fletcher, Chapter Two.’

Anya leaned up to kiss him, her free arm banding around him like she’d never let him go. "Oh, please. If you’d just opened your eyes – I’m right here with you, and here’s where I’m staying." Another kiss, then: "Okay, that’s settled. Now let’s discuss this stupid Ripper idea of yours."

Dawn suddenly remembered that even in a house of spies it was extremely bad manners to, you know, spy, and she backed away before the yelling and/or hardcore smooching could start. Besides, she wanted to steal a Diet Coke from Anya’s supplies, and then she thought she’d go upstairs and play Grand Theft Auto, if she could wrestle the Playstation away from Andrew.

When she went by the four candles burning in the entryway, though, she stopped and made a couple of wishes.

***

The windowless room was silent, hot, with only the faintest traces of death still hanging in the air. Pennith thought he might have to do something about that soon. But at the moment – "Do you have any information on how to keep this thing alive?"

When his hand brushed against the leaves of the boium tree taken from the late tribute-giver, he felt a slight acid-burn along every nerve-ending. The pain made him smile, but he also took a step back. No use in wasting good material.

Wrapping himself more tightly in his cloak, Master Hat sniffed at the leaves. "We do have the brief instructions we beat out of Grittnak before we killed him. Moderate sunshine, distilled water, fertilise three times a week with crushed bones of Noothian canusses. We didn’t actually get a source for the canusses, however."

Pennith sighed. "If it needs sunshine, why is it here? Inside, in the dark?"

"Because you asked for it, sir."

"Ah. Of course. But I’ll ask you to put it outside now. You’ll also have to find the fertiliser, you know. Kill what you need to."

Master Hat growled, a clearing of the throat. "Yes. May I also say-- we’ve had reports that others are interested in Grittnak’s collection."

"Really?" He crushed a leaf between his fingers, added the hiss of searing scales to his thoughts. "Who?"

"Unfortunately, it was the local Romut pack who told us; it’s hard to make much out of them at the best of times, sir. But it seems that four humans went inside Grittnak’s abode, prowled around, then left."

"Four humans....the Beresfords and the Alleyns, perhaps?" He tried to repress the flare of magick he felt, tried not to breathe out fury and pain. No use in wasting it.

Master Hat said, "From their vague description – fish-drunk, the Romut fools – I’d say it was at the very least the Beresfords. There was stink of Watcher from the older man, apparently, and hints of it from the others."

"Interesting. That is interesting indeed." He began to pace. "Perhaps Garrison and Bixp should be sent to investigate, see if the humans left anything behind." He shot a look at his associate. "See if they can redeem themselves after that fiasco at the Museum."

"Sir, how were they to know that someone had set wards on the files? And who would have predicted the British Museum humans would have been stupid enough to use fire as a safety feature in that particular room?"

"Yes, yes, but we’ve lost an excellent lead on the Cup of Xet through their misjudgement. Perhaps we need to – correct – them?"

Although Master Hat bowed in response, the folds of the cloak susurrating on the floor, Pennith saw that the creature was backing away even as he made obeisance. That might bear watching. He forced himself to smile, saying, "Just send them, Master Hat. I’ll deal with possible rebellions later."

He clearly took the appropriate meaning. The hood falling over his eyes as he bowed his head again, he murmured, "I’m sure that rebellions will mean nothing once the Rising Time is here, sir. And, if you’ll excuse me –" He collected the boium tree, holding it like the prize it was. "I’ll just put this outside."

"Well done, Master Hat. The Rising Time shall be your reward," Pennith said in dismissal.

Once alone, Pennith sat down at his desk and shuffled the few notes he had gleaned regarding the Cup of Xet’s location. Pity that Grittnak or the would-be Watcher hadn’t known anything, but nothing to be done about it. They would serve to feed the river.

He lit the black candles he always had at the ready, and breathed in the enhanced smoke of blood and death. Yes, a little meditation was in order before the evening’s work. Souls and demon-spirits didn’t just take themselves, even with expert help.

***

The back of the MI5 surveillance van was dimly lit and uncomfortable, but it was the fucking heat that was getting to Giles. The heat, and the edginess.

Anya fell against him when they took an especially sharp turn around a corner. Although her shoulder dug painfully into his, she kept on chatting to Zoe about some plot twist in the Tommy and Tuppence books they’d been exchanging, with the tech specialist Malcolm occasionally putting in his own view. Still furious that she’d lost the battle about tonight’s reconnoitre, it seemed; as angry as she’d been all afternoon, he might be enjoying domestic silence for a good long while. Well, at least he wouldn’t have to talk about his bloody feelings any more.

He leaned his head back and closed his eyes. Wished he had a cigarette. However, that would come later. Now he needed to breathe, recall who he was supposed to be –

Danny’s voice interrupted. "Hey, Giles. No sleeping on duty."

The MI5 man, all teeth and dark gleam, was grinning at him when he opened his eyes. Giles said, "For fuck’s sake, Danny, shouldn’t you be preparing for your contact rather than bothering me?"

"I’m ready to rock and roll, mate. Bernard Oyo is a prize, and with my interrogation stylings, he’s sure to tell all about Cassa Dreams."

"Don’t you think it’s odd that with all your resources, you lot have only found the last client?" He remembered the young man vaguely from that night: the sobs and the cries from inside the Working Room, the tracks of tears still on his dark cheeks, the way he’d promised to return. For what, Giles wondered – but then it was Danny’s job to find out.

"Bit worrying, maybe." As the van braked, Danny said, "Ah, I think this is our stop. The night life of Brixton, nothing like it."

"Yes," Giles said. "I remember." He wished he didn’t.

A shove made him blink. Anya was close, her smile like the surprise of cool water in the desert. Carefully she rolled up first one of his sleeves, then the other, exposing what was left of his tattoo. Under her breath she said, "Don’t forget, you’re not allowed to do anything stupid. More stupid, I mean."

"Thank you for your faith, darling." Once she let go, he checked his earpiece, saying to Zoe, "I still don’t think you’ll be able to hear anything – the equipment failed when we were at the medium’s, and Griffin’s magick will be at least as powerful. Don’t storm the place if the comm link goes down."

Zoe said, "I run this op, Giles. If you’re in there too long, we’re coming in; all you’re doing is gathering intel, remember. Don’t be a hero."

"No worries. It’ll be fine," he said, hoping against hope he wasn’t lying.

Danny threw open the back door, letting in even more heat. "Right, mate, we’re on."

As soon as the van door shut behind them, Danny wandered down the street toward the council estate where Bernard Oyo lived. Even in Giles’s uncorrected vision – cos Ripper didn’t wear specs, right – he had lost all traces of the rising young MI5 star he was. Looked like a thug. Looked right at home.

They were in one of the less savoury areas of Brixton: a couple of empty building sites along the road, full of charred boards and rubbish; neon and fluorescent light flickering over the cracked pavements, and the people who moved in and out of shadow. From a warehouse nearby came the thud-thud-thud of dance music, overlaid with laughter that sounded like screams.

One foot up on the kerb, Giles lit himself a cigarette. When his boot scuffed against an oil stain, he rubbed the stuff on the other leg of his jeans. Nice smudge there, made it look real. Slouching, he took off in the other direction.

The remnant of the mark of Eyghon was starting to burn.

Griffin Hartman’s tattoo shop Body Frontiers was only a few doors down. Giles made himself inventory the shadows around it, note the days-old Nuyy slime trail on the pavement, smell the dried blood. Yeah, the shop hadn’t fucking changed much in almost thirty years.

Zoe said in his ear, "We’re reading sounds just fine. And we’ve got visual to the front of the shop."

He made a noncommittal noise, while he mentally went over the spells he’d checked with Willow that afternoon. Not that he could let himself think of Willow, or Buffy who so despised him, or his Anya waiting for his return. Couldn’t let himself remember anything but his cover.

He took another drag, blew out a stream of smoke, and then reached up to grab a handful of grey. "Tutamen," he whispered, then let it go. The smoke curled once around his body, a veil of ash, before dissipating into the night. His old mark scorched higher, flame under a burner. He’d done that one right.

When his hand pushed open the door of Griffin’s, he could feel the dark magic surround him – and the feedback, then silence, in his earpiece told him he’d lost contact.

The public area of the shop looked normal enough: dark in the corners, heavily scented with antiseptic and incense, a low-level machine buzz in the background, but with normal chairs, needles and equipment, with an ordinary wall of tattoo designs. A small, aging woman, a needle in her hand, bent over a young man stretched out on his stomach, but she glanced up at the shutting door. "Can I help you?" she said in a rasp.

"Yeah. Here for a Special. Name’s Ripper."

She looked at him, then pressed a button on her workstation; a hidden door, part of the wall of designs, swung open. "Go on, then," she said, bending again to her work.

He tossed the cigarette on the floor, crushed it out with his boot. The rotation carried him back almost thirty years – _‘Go on, Ripper,’ Ethan had said, pushing him forward from one side. Diedre’s hand molded his spine from the other side, her whisper under Ethan’s: "Go on, Ripper. It’s only going to hurt for a little while."_

He walked through the open door into the black room.

***

"You can try to fix your sound link all you want, Malcolm, but it’s not going to help." Anya tapped her foot on the van’s floor, trying to resist her competing impulses to wrap her arms and her fear around herself, or to go grab Rupert by the collar of his black spy-shirt and drag him back to her. "This isn’t technology, it’s bad magick."

"That’s ridiculous," Malcolm the geek-guy said. "Let me just tweak a few things –"

As he started to play with his controls, Zoe leaned forward. "Anya, are you okay? Perhaps you shouldn’t be on the team if the op worries you so." When Anya stared at her, though, she backed off. "Or not. Of course Tuppence should be here, waiting for Tommy."

"That’s correct. Of course I should be here," Anya repeated, in case anyone had missed this important point. "And how long has it been now?"

"Only ten minutes, five since we lost contact. You have to give him time," Zoe said.

"I know that." Seeking distraction from nerves and irritation, Anya opened her purse. Wallet, work mobile, The Fashion in Shrouds (Campion was just as stupid as Rupert, it was turning out), a bag of crushed bitterdeath for breaking wards in case she had to go get him...oh here, her Giles and Jenkins PDA. It might be soothing to look at their tasks for tomorrow, since Andrew had loaded them this afternoon.

When she pulled up her calendar, however, she paused at the second entry. Something about the the address of the Minton property she and Rupert were about to start researching... she said, "Does anyone have a London A to Z handy?"

Malcolm’s hand went to his laptop computer. "Got an even better database in here, Anya. Why?"

"I’m curious about another job. Its location?" She crawled across the van, then showed him the address from Lady Rosemary’s file.

Squinting for a second over his glasses, he put it into his computer. After a second or two, he said, "Odd. That address is on the next street. Wait. No, actually, it’s behind the tattoo shop. See, the empty site?" His finger pointed at a black spot on the map.

Anya’s heart lurched; she neither liked or believed in coincidence. As she dug in her phone for the work mobile, she said, "Okay, before I start jumping to conclusions and getting even more nervous, tell me where we are." If only she’d ever done a vengeance job down here, no, not vengeance, but if only she knew what to look for –

"Brixton. You know that," Zoe said. "What’s this about, Anya?"

"Is the place called anything else, though?" Checking the PDA, she found Lady Rosemary’s number. Even though it was probably past the old lady’s bedtime, she began to punch it in anyway.

Smiling, Zoe said, "Well, I remember when we were kids, we’d say it this way: Brixton, borough of Lambeth, city of...."

And Anya’s breath seized hard. "‘Lambeth’? We’re in a part of Lambeth?" At Zoe’s and Malcolm’s questioning looks, she snapped, "You know! ‘Ian Gold, Lambeth’! The original information Harry gave us? Because Rupert and I found out that it wasn’t Ian Gold, and because of something Nalph said – oh no, Nalph – we figured it wasn’t Lambeth either. But what if it is?"

"Anya, you think the site you and Giles are privately researching might have something to do with the Yeangelt matter?" Zoe said.

"Maybe. And maybe whatever the hell Rupert’s walking into right now has something to do–" When the phone connected, she said to whoever answered, "Oh, hello. Is Lady Rosemary available? It’s Anya, um, Giles, from Giles and Jenkins, Investigations and Acquisitions. We’re doing some – Okay, it’s late, I’m sorry. Could I leave a message for Lady Rosemary? Or, wait, do you have a contact number for Jools Siviter? – No, a message. If either one could call the Giles and Jenkins number as soon as possible; we’re checking on any possible buyers for her Lambeth property – Yes. Thank you, sorry again."

After throwing the mobile and PDA back into her purse, she did allow herself to wrap her arms around her stomach, to hold in the upset and fright.

"You’re afraid that Pennith or his associates might be trying to purchase that land, then," Zoe said. "Which might have a link to Body Frontiers– Right. Malcolm, anything on the comm from Giles?" At the tech guy’s shake of the head, she wiped her hands on her trousers and muttered, "So this must be how Tom always felt."

Even as scared as Anya was, she felt a twinge of curiosity. "What Tom?"

"My old section-chief, who had a breakdown and disappeared a few months ago," Zoe said quietly. "Your, er, friend Tara gave me a message about him, remember. I’m trying to find him, bring him back home."

"Oh. That Tom. The one whom everyone thought was a traitor. Yes, Rupert told me." Anya’s foot began tapping again, each click a mark of time passing, time passed. After she cast a glance at the video monitor Malcolm had rigged, and at the completely Rupert-free pavement in front of the tattoo shop, she said, "What time is it now?"

"Anya, it hasn’t been long enough," Zoe said.

***

The black room of Body Frontiers, the heart of the shop, was much as he remembered. Dark lacquered paint everywhere, one wall of burned-down candles and another of glass containers of inks on built-in shelves, a fall of Ihioo skulls in one corner, the worn chairs and glittering machinery. Even the false door in the back wall was familiar, as was the magick circle deeply cut into the floor–

As was the tall, unkempt man standing by the largest chair. A little shaggier, greyer, tattoos now covering every inch of exposed skin below the neck – but the same man, with the same power.

"Griffin," Giles said. "Long time."

"Ripper. Decades, hasn’t it been? Never thought I’d hear from you again," Griffin said. "Where are all your mates?"

"Gone." But he couldn’t spare a thought for those lost to Eyghon, or to Ethan, found dead in that Initiative prison. "The last one standing, yeah."

"Then sit down," Griffin said, gesturing to the chair. "And tell me what Special I can get for you. We can catch up while I work."

Taking a deep breath, Giles moved to the chair. Although his tattoo burned, he could feel the protection spell pushing against whatever Griffin was working. He wouldn’t have much time before it broke, however.

As he sat down, he said, "I want you to close the circle on my chaos mark. Shut down the power."

"That’s not one of my Specials, which you know very well. I call power, not reject it. I take, I do not give," Griffin said softly. When he bent forward to look at Giles’s arm, he gave a low whistle. "And you’ve had someone else touching my art. Ruining it."

This was true enough, Giles thought: before the coven would pool their goodness in order to help Willow, Gillian and Margaret had been deputised to cleanse him. They’d made him listen to whale music and chant while they drew out the worst of the old magick and pigment – a painful business all around. "Not enough to ruin it, mate. I can still feel the mark." This was true as well.

Griffin were only a few inches away now, with his tattoo artist’s gloves wrapped tight around Giles’s arm, already stretching the skin for the needle. "I’m sure you do. What would you like to replace the call of Eyghon, Ripper? Keeping in mind the needs of my art, of course."

He’d researched this carefully all afternoon, thought about what he could get away with. And he’d thought then, as he thought now, of Grittnak and that devastated garden in the sun. He said, "Cover it with a web. Not a spiderweb, but like it, in shades of blue."

"Webs aren’t fully closed. Holes everywhere, don’t you remember?"

"They’re strong enough to hold treasure, though," he said, remembering a winter night and luminescent wings and Anya.

"They also hold prey." Griffin’s smile widened. "A fine compromise between your, er, request and my talents." Then, with a sudden move, he sniffed at Giles. "What do you smell of, man?"

"Cigarettes, mate. Just cigarettes. Must be catching a whiff of that incense in the other room."

"Oh, that must be it." A trickle of laughter, before he moved to the shelves full of bottles. For the first time, Giles realised that a repeated thud, like bass from a stereo, was coming from a distance, vibrating the walls. As Griffin’s hands moved over the glass, lifting then putting back this and the other, inspecting one or two in the candlelight, he said, "Now, Ripper, what will you pay me to, um, close the circle? Your last tribute years ago was magnificent; the potion you found at your old tutor’s house, do you recall? Hellsbane-based, wasn’t it?"

‘Tribute’, Giles thought, Grittnak had steered him straight – but in Ripper’s voice, he said, "Fucking hell, it’s ‘tribute’ now?"

Griffin turned around, opaque glass jar in hand. "Did I say ‘tribute’? I can’t imagine why. I meant ‘payment,’ of course."

"Yeah? What are your rates these days?" Giles said, as he watched Griffin pull up a stool next to the chair, arrange the needles and intake mechanism, and then breathe a spell over the implements. At the magick, the remnants of the Eyghon-mark flared so hot that he had to bite down on a groan. When he could, he said, "More hellsbane, something like that?"

"Not exactly. I want only what you already have." As he reached for another, larger opaque jar, Griffin produced a cloth from nowhere. He poured a few drops of green liquid onto the material, listened to it hiss. "Now then, Ripper. Let’s prepare the canvas before we actually start the needle."

The protection spell rippled like smoke over Giles’s skin. He watched the cloth come closer, could feel the hiss even as the sound dissolved into air, into that strange distant thudding – and just as the acid burned through the veil of protection, he realised what the liquid had to be.

Boium-distillation. And if it had Uih blood –

Moving through the burn, he drove his free hand into Griffin’s nose. The man screamed, fell back against the shelves; the impact set the glass jars sliding, ringing against each other. "Don’t want to cross that particular frontier, Griffin," he said, scrambling out of the chair.

"Just another boundary, isn’t it?" the man choked. He moved like water, like ink, away from the next punch Giles threw. Slithering past, he picked up a needle, dipped it in the first jar he’d brought down, then drove it down into the crook of Giles’s elbow, at the bottom point of the mark of Eyghon.

Giles felt hidden chaos burst to the surface of his skin, drawn by the needle just as his blood was. It was old pain, new pleasure, one sharp tear in the fabric that separated reason from madness –

And, his hesitations shredding like a knife through a web, he threw the sorcerer into the shelves one more time. The shelves cracked hard. Glass shattered.

As Griffin’s head collided with wood and broken glass and the spill of what wasn’t ink, he cried, "Who are you now?"

Giles pulled Griffin up. "Don’t need to know, mate," he said, and he shoved the man, face first, into the back wall. Made a fucking nice sound.

As Griffin collapsed onto the brick, the back door that Giles had thought was false cracked open. The sound, the rhythm – it was the amplified bass of dance-music, pouring out of wherever that door led.

Giles took a deep breath, exhaling adrenaline and bad magick as best he could. Then he checked Griffin. The man wasn’t dead, just unconscious; didn’t seem likely to be going anywhere anytime soon. Next, he looked at his own wound, found a clean cloth and fashioned a quick bandage to stop the bleeding. He was going to be in such trouble for this, he thought, but the lingering trace of chaos in his veins and in his head overrode his domestic concerns.

It was the lingering trace of chaos that made him pick up one of the candles from the wall and open the door wider, step inside a dark, earthen tunnel.

It was hotter here than in the black room. The dirt shook underfoot and overhead, pulsing with the music’s beat. Since the candlelight didn’t show very much, wavering even in the dead air, he put his hand out to the wall. Ground crumbled into his fingers. Unstable, very unstable.

He kept going toward the bass, though, until the tunnel turned sharply to the right, and his hand touched splintery wood. It was a door, yet there was no handle. No way to get in.

Most of whatever Griffin had dosed him with had bled or been breathed out, he could tell. Reason was returning to him, and it was in no way reasonable that, unprepared, he should go further at the moment. He needed to research. He needed to get back to Anya.

So he turned around and headed back, ignoring the beats that shook the tunnel. After a few moments, he could hear a new sound, bell-chime sweet and piercing: "I am going to murder him. I am going to murder him slowly and extremely painfully, and where the hell is that torch, Zoe?"

Hurrying his steps, he walked into the black room. Anya had Zoe by the arm and was dragging her toward the door. Smiling, he blew out his candle. "You can stop threatening now, darling, I’m here."

"You idiot!" And she hurled herself into his arms. Repressing a groan at the pain, he brought her close to him, buried his face in her hair. She whispered, "Are you okay? You scared me, honey. Don’t scare me like that again."

Dimly he heard Zoe say, "Well, at least you’re all right. But where’s Hartman?"

"What?" He looked up, tried to focus. The shelves and glass were still shattered, signs of their fight everywhere, but no sign of Griffin. Trying not to panic: "He was passed out right there when I left! Well, er, knocked out....Did you not see him leave?"

"We saw nothing, Malcolm’s video got nothing. The place was empty when we stormed in to rescue you because I couldn’t wait any longer," Anya said into his shirt. She sniffed hard, then looked up. "Okay, so we have a disappearing bad-magick-practitioner. Guess what else we, and also Danny, found out while you were being stupid?"

***

"So, Danny’s contact was losing his mind," Dawn summed up. "Like, crazy-mean. Soul-losing crazy-mean."

"From some potion administered by the mind-controlled Cassa Dreams," Andrew said, clarifying the story. "The same potion that the disappearing sorcerer-dude tried to give Giles."

"And there’s a secret passageway between Body Frontiers and that warehouse nightclub place. Which is probably, no, 99% certain evil and Pennith-controlled." Dawn looked at Andrew, her lower lip going out. "It is so wrong we had to stay home tonight."

Anya sighed. One hand on the arch between hall and living room, she kicked off her heels and rubbed at her sore toes, saying, "Never mind. Like I said, you’ll probably be called upon for a special spy-mission tomorrow night –"

"No, they will not. Did you not hear Buffy this afternoon?" Rupert said from behind her.

She looked around. His shoes discarded, he’d wandered off somewhere after setting the wards on the house – but he was back now with two glasses of Scotch on the rocks, which meant it was her time. They hadn’t had a chance for private discussion in the MI5 van on the way home, and she had several points to make about male arrogance and the folly of allowing bad-magick practitioners with needles near one’s tender skin. He probably needed a proper bandage. And she needed him.

"Oh, Giles, come on!" Dawn began.

Anya shook her head, stopping her in mid-whine. "We’ll talk about this tomorrow. Time for you two to go upstairs, and we’ll see you at breakfast." As they trooped toward the stairs, she added, just for Dawn’s ears, "I’m on your side. Also, thank you for lighting the candles while we were gone."

Dawn smiled. "Made a wish, too. And thanks right back."

As junior Watcher feet tramped up the stairs, Anya turned to her errant man. His eyes looked a bit odd, all glittering and dark, but his smile was sweet. He held out one of the tumblers. "Nightcap, darling?"

She took it, took a mouthful of fire, then said, "But do you think you should be having any liquor? Who knows what that horrible Griffin person stuck in your arm, there could be an adverse reaction –"

"‘m fine, stop fussing." His unhurt arm dropped heavily over her shoulders. "I’ve locked up. You ready for bed?"

"Yep." As they started upstairs, she said, "I think we should discuss exactly what happened–"

Then his mouth stopped hers. Pulling her into his body, he somehow managed to lift her up a step yet keep on kissing, deep and a little smoky and heated. Somehow she forgot the topic of her planned scolding. Something about... God, he tasted good... no, it was gone. She caught at balance, caught at him.

Lifting his head, he smiled against her lips. "You go on, darling, take the bathroom first. Be there in a second."

"You’d better not be going to listen to music this late," she said, even as she went up the next steps. "Besides, I thought you’d be tired from investigating evil in such a very idiotic –"

His hand smacked her bottom, sharp and hot. "Go," he said.

While ordinarily she’d have mentioned something about crankiness and unacceptable commands, there was something in his voice and in the tingles his hand left behind that made her hurry.

Catching up her silk nightshirt – although it was hot enough to sleep naked – she went into the master bathroom. Even as she slipped out of her clothes, washed up, and optimistically dabbed perfume between her breasts, she listened to the odd sounds coming from their bedroom. What was he doing, what on _earth_ was he doing –

The remnant tingles spread upward, a web of desire through her stomach, across her breasts, into her throat. A couple of sips of Scotch just intensified the connections, the warmth. He had looked like silver and sex when he’d come out of that tunnel, she thought, like all her comfort and all her dark dreams. He had come back to her one more time.

When she walked out of the bathroom, she lost her breath. Already undressed, his silk pajama trousers almost slipping off his hips, he leaned against the foot of their bed, sipping from his glass. And he watched her, his eyes darker now than before in the flicker of the candles he’d lit. "There won’t be any talking about work tonight," he said quietly.

"‘Kay. I see the candles, honey." She glanced at his wounded arm: not much left to clean up. "Do you want a bandage for that?"

"Don’t need one," he said. There was something funny about his voice, a roughness she wasn’t used to. Her breathing quickened, speeding even more when he said,"I need you to come here."

"‘Kay," she said again. "But, um, I’ve got this glass, and I need to take off my jewellery."

He reached her, took her glass away and put it with his on the bookcase. A kiss, harder and deeper than on the staircase, and then his hand closed possessively on hers. "No, don’t take your ring off, darling."

"But it’s –"

"Don’t." Before she could continue, he had spun her around. Off balance, she grabbed at their bedstead, her hands locking on the wrought iron. And he was behind her, crowding her, his hot breath on her neck. She could feel his erection, urgent pressure on her back. "Here’s the thing," he said in her ear. "I feel bloody strange tonight."

He felt great, but – oh, right, she got it. "It’s whatever that Griffin person did, isn’t it. All bad magick and what not, calling up who you were."

"Maybe." He kissed the length of her neck, tongue licking delicately on the vein. The web of desire tightened, and she clutched harder at the bedstead. "Or maybe it’s the heat. Maybe, dearest, it’s just you."

His hand wrapped around her hand with the ring, pressing her fingers almost painfully into the iron. His other hand stole under the silk, over the hipbone and down. He crowded closer, hardness riding her back.

Overhead something fell hard enough to shudder the floor, then Dawn squeaked over Andrew’s protest.

In Anya’s ear Rupert said, so low it was almost a growl, "I realised something. You know why I don’t talk when I’m inside you? 'Cos I like to listen to the sounds you make. The things you say, the way you moan, Christ –" And she did moan, an exhalation of pleasure, when his finger stroked inside her. "But I need you to be quiet tonight, don’t want the children to hear. Can you be quiet?"

"Are you going to talk, then?" she said, or tried to say. Could barely breathe, could only feel.

Two fingers now sliding wetly inside, then out; his pressure on her back, pressure on her heart. "Yeah. Give it a shot," he said, his voice even deeper. "But first, darling, can you step into these shoes?"

As his legs moved against hers, silk and heat and iron, she forced herself to look down. Oh, he’d dug out her five-inch fetish heels from the back of the closet. Her heart constricted, love and desire knotting together. She pushed herself up enough to get one foot, then the other, in the heels. Even as he let his pajama trousers fall, she rose against him, the angle changing.

Then his hardness slid down, then forward. The tip of his cock touched her right there, sharp pleasure, just enough pressure, a motion mimicking what would follow – oh God oh God, she needed to cry out. But he wanted her to be quiet. She could be quiet for him.

He spread out the fingers of their joined hands on the bedstead, evening out their weight so that the ring didn’t cut so much. With his other hand he unbuttoned her nightshirt, fingers fluttering against her skin. He didn’t stop the movement of his hips, sliding against her over and over; not inside yet, time not right yet, but any minute now. He whispered against her skin, "Making different, better choices for you... my dearest, my treasure... so hot and sweet." Then he positioned her for him – "Never leave you, don’t leave, mine–"

With the last word he did thrust in, hard and smooth. His other hand slipped around to cup her, bring her closer, pleasure and pressure inside and out. "I’m yours, and you’re mine, isn’t that right–"

"That’s right, honey," she whispered despite instructions. "I’m yours, and you’re mine."

Different, better choices, she thought hazily, through the love that held her fast. And as soon as the current crisis was over – oh God oh God, he was right there, so good, so good – she was going to make sure of him.

He always said he wanted her to have what she wanted, after all.


	3. Chapter 3

The hidden room, smelling of earth and magick and sickness, was quiet.

In the bed that dominated the room, the tattooed man lay silent and unmoving – gone further, deeper than sleep. Across his battered face flickered the occasional sign of pain, but it was random.

By the light of three black candles, a seemingly small, aging woman plied her needle on a square of silk. She stitched with care, with incantations, with intent. The sigil took shape, took on meaning.

When she tied off the thread, the knot meeting the silk, the man cried out. Yet he didn’t wake.

She picked up another square and began again.

***

"I want you to take this, Rupert," Anya said, charging into the conference room with a bottle of aspirin and some water. "If we knew more about whatever the Griffin bastard stuck you with, we could find a mystical antidote, but for now this human over-the-counter remedy will have to do."

"Thank you, darling, but as I already told you five sodding times, most of the potion bled out last night," Giles said, not looking up from his papers.

" _Most of_ isn’t good enough. Take it."

"I’m fine, Anya."

Nevertheless, she pushed the medicine and water into his hands. He stared at her over the top of his glasses. She folded her arms and frowned until he sighed, shook out a couple of pills from the bottle, and tossed them back.

From her vantage point next to him at the conference table, Dawn had to suppress a giggle. They were going to be like this forever, she thought; like, when Giles was eighty, Anya would be all ‘don’t forget your pills, Rupert, have you taken your pills,’ and he’d be a martyr about it, and the world would be perfectly balanced on its axis because of their push-and-pull.

Even so, Dawn thought that Anya was right to fuss this time. All morning he’d looked way too pale, with dark circles under darker eyes. Anya seemed really jumpy about it: heels clattering louder wherever she went, bigger gestures, higher voice. Mostly she touched him more than usual, which was a whole lot. She held onto him in the Tube on the way to the office, and once there kept getting up from her desk every five minutes to check on him. Even though it obviously was driving him crazy, each time he’d stop whatever he was doing and hold her hand or something before returning to work –

Like he was doing right now. After a kiss to her palm, he let her go. "We should begin the meeting. Where’s–"

"Here, here, sorry," Andrew said, falling through the door with an armful of folders and phones. "I was just confirming the imminent delivery of Cluth the Gifted’s mirror, and ....Oh. Anyway." He sat down opposite Dawn on Anya’s side, arranged the phones in front of him in a professional manner, then put on a look of rapt attention. "I’m ready!"

"Excellent enthusiasm, Andrew," Anya said. She took her seat beside him and opened her own notebook. "First on the agenda is the proposed intelligence-gathering tonight at the warehouse nightclub thing in Brixton. Dawn, what did you find out about the club itself?"

"Okay. According to _Time Out_ and the two websites I checked, the place recently changed its name to the Frontier–"

"Another synonym for ‘border,’" Giles said.

"Which links to ‘boundary’ and also to the tattoo shop, so it’s all creepy and terminal-ish," she finished. "It’s very popular, apparently. Says here that it caters to a ‘mixed crowd’ and offers a variety of, um, ‘music and pleasures.’ Again with the creepy."

"Danny sent what he could find on the building floor plan," Giles said. He passed out copies of a blueprint, the smudginess of which made Dawn squint. Red marker circled one corner of the plan. "The indicated area should be the offices and secondary access. That’s our target."

Dawn’s fingers tingled. "'Our target?'"

"Not yours, Dawn." His eyes were kind, but he wore what Willow called his England-Stands-Firm expression. "You know Buffy doesn’t wish you to go on the more dangerous missions. So–" he looked back at his notes – "I’ve got a call in to Zoe, requesting at least one section-member’s assistance. We’re going to need a diversion in the main club, large enough to call the attention of whoever Yeangelt higher-up is there, draw him out of the offices. If we do it when the club is open, the, um, resulting mess should give us enough time to search."

Andrew was whispering, "Pick me pick me pick me –"

"You’ll accompany whoever MI5 gives us, Andrew," Anya said. Although Giles took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes, he didn’t contradict her. "I’m thinking a little light demon-summoning at the right time would be handy."

"Yes!" Andrew said, pumping his fist in the air, then sheepishly sinking into his seat. Dawn decided if he even thought about gloating, she was going to do something horrible to him. Maybe she’d tell Xander and Spike about the large glossy pictures of them he had hidden in his closet; she bet that would pass Anya’s acid-test for vengeance.

"Right, good," Giles said, pulling her back to the moment. "We’ll work out the logistics later. While the diversion is going on, Anya and I’ll, er, steal into the office from the back door and see what we can find."

"If they’re good supervillains, they should have a board listing their master plans, and–" Andrew said, not getting how stupid he was until he caught a stern glance from Anya. "Oh. Sorry."

Dawn couldn’t stop herself from demanding, "Since when is either one of you capable of sneaking around and stealing stuff? Let’s think about who’s demonstrated what skills here!" When Giles and Anya stared at her, she shrank a little. "I’m just saying."

Weirdly, they looked at each other and smiled. "It shouldn’t be a problem," they said together.

"You have no idea the kind of gadget Rupert keeps in his wallet," Anya continued. "Besides, we might need to use magicks which you haven’t mastered yet."

"It’s just not–" Dawn began, but the spy phone rang at that moment.

Anya reached over and grabbed it. "Tuppence here. – Oh, Miss Carter." Smile turned to frown as she listened. Giles leaned back in his chair; even with a lingering smile, he really did look sick, Dawn thought. Anya was starting to look sick too from whatever she was hearing, until finally: "Okay, I understand. Tommy will be there."

"What’s wrong?" Giles said, as she put down the phone.

Anya said, "Harry wants to talk to you, no one knows why. Zoe said to meet him, eleven o’clock, outside Thames House on the river side. But also, because of some internal politics thing, she doesn’t know if we’ll have any help tonight."

Before he could speak, Dawn jumped in. "If you’re shorthanded, then you have to let me go on the mission!"

"No, Dawn." England-Stands-Stupidly-Firm alright.

Casting a quick glance at Dawn, a ‘let me handle it’ look, Anya said, "Zoe offered to go on her own time, but since Pennith has seen her –"

"Right, she’s blown. She could watch outside, but not go with Andrew. If we can’t find a fourth, Danny perhaps–"

"I should go," Dawn said again.

At that moment two of the phones went off, their rings staggered and dissonant. Anya got the private line. It seemed to be one of the construction types, because she spun out of the conference room, talking a mile a minute about framing and work schedules.

Business line – Andrew was faster than Dawn to pick it up, his "Giles and Jenkins, Investigations and Acquisitions," smug and deserving retribution. After listening for a second, he said, "Yes, Mr Siviter. Mr Giles is right here."

As Giles took the phone, he raised his eyebrows at them. Dawn, reading the sign correctly, pulled Andrew’s sleeve, got out of the conference room. Behind them Giles said, "Yes, Jools –"

"–we’d need to coordinate the electrical work with the new plasterboard. No, no, no!" Anya said as the two of them walked through the office. Because she looked like she was going to start throwing office supplies, they went on out into the outer corridor where they could shut the door behind them.

Andrew leaned against it, then glanced at Dawn. Yeah, he knew– "‘Pick me pick me pick me’?" she mocked. "You asshole."

"You’re a mean if shiny-haired young woman," he said. Then: "Well, okay, but I didn’t know that I’d have to be doing the mission alone! I don’t think I’m ready to spy solo."

"You won’t be, Andrew, because I’m so going."

"Nuh-uh. That was Giles’s serious-Watcher face." Which he demonstrated, badly.

"Whatever. I’ll just have to talk to him. It’s not like it’s Buffy’s call." She looked down at her foot, toeing a line along the floorboards. Crossing the frontier into the terminal, she thought, crossing the boundary –

The stairwell door opened, and Gerry, the gorgeous UPS guy, walked in with a package. "Oi, Investigations and Acquisitions youngsters!"

"Is that for us, Gerald?" Andrew said, smiling, then blocking Dawn in a shifty move that almost guaranteed Xander and Spike would be learning about his little fantasies.

"Yeah. It’s fragile stuff." He flashed perfect teeth as he handed Andrew the box, then smiled even wider at Dawn when she peeked around. "Sign for it, Miss Summers?" Which was cool, and vengeance in itself.

As she finished writing her name and Andrew finished checking the shipment, Anya came out of the office. "Gerry! You’re right on time with the merchandise."

"We’ve got a good team, Anya, as do you," he said, one more big smile before he disappeared through the door. Great angle, Dawn thought, then nudged Andrew so he could close his mouth before actual drooling occurred.

"You two shouldn’t ogle the delivery man’s rounded bottom, even if his shorts do make it a feature," Anya said briskly. "Okay, staff meeting’s cancelled. Andrew, you and I are going to Nalph’s to meet our client, hand over this merchandise, and receive our payment. I’ve got the bill ready."

"I’m going to the Mysterious Emporium? But –"

"Despite Nalph being a double-dealing Mikh bastard who’s probably in league with the forces of evil, you need to make a better impression on him than last time, when you shattered all those petrified Nop hearts. He’s a client too, after all. More important, we can get the word on who’s in town, available to be summoned." She put her hand on Dawn’s shoulder. "Rupert wants you to help him before he leaves, Dawn. And please watch him for me. I know he doesn’t feel well, no matter what his stiff upper lip says."

"You got it. I’ll call your cell if he gets wobbly and I think you should come back," Dawn said. She didn’t even step more than once on Andrew’s toes as the two of them left – the worry in Anya’s voice made her stomach feel a little twisty.

It twisted up even more at the sight of Giles in the conference room, his fingers pressing against his forehead like he was trying to squeeze the pain out.

When she walked in, though, he looked up and tried to smile. "There you are, Dawn. I have a research job for you. Jools Siviter gave me the name of the potential buyer for Lady Rosemary’s property, and–"

"Just a second, okay?" She handed him his water, then sat down. "Boy, you look awful. You should probably be forcing fluids or something, that’s what Mom would have said."

An eyebrow raise at that. "Thank you, I’ll keep it in mind. Now, if you’ll take notes? David Penn was the name–"

"Yeah, yeah, I’ll be research girl in a minute, but a question first." Stomping on any guilty hesitancy, she said, "Giles, why don’t you want me to go on the mission tonight? Really?"

"I should have known you wouldn’t let it rest." Frowning, he took off his glasses again and leaned back in his chair. "To answer your question – aside from the, er, possible disaster attendant on a barely trained seventeen-year-old girl going undercover, Buffy doesn’t want you on these types of mission. As you very well know, Dawn."

When he stared at her, she felt like she was being handed a failing grade on the most important test ever. But that wasn’t going to stop her. "I don’t care what Buffy thinks, it’s what you think. This isn’t Slayer business, you know? This is about being a Watcher, finding stuff out."

"No, it isn’t." He reached for his water. "And I’m not a Watcher any more."

"Yes you are, and God, what did Buffy say to you?"

He didn’t pretend to misunderstand. "It isn’t your business. Suffice it to say that when Anya and I agreed you would live with us, Buffy made it clear that she is still, er, your guardian and protector. My opinion here doesn’t count." He sipped his water, then pushed it away. "And I repeat, I’m no longer part of the Council."

"You so are, whether you get paid or not. And I think Buffy’s just jealous, ‘cause I get to pretend you’re my dad just like she always wanted.... Um. Can we forget I said that?"

A real Giles-smile warmed his face. "I didn’t hear anything." But his smile died, leaving him paler than before. He hesitated a long time, his fingers worrying the edges of his papers, before he said, "Your analysis is quite wrong, however. Buffy’s justified in what she says. Perhaps I _should_ tell you...Christ knows it’s been bloody hard to keep Anya quiet."

"And, like, you think that’s even going to last?" She smiled, even though her stomach was twisting up again, she didn’t know why.

Sighing, he looked away – at nothing, at bad memories. But his voice was dry and precise. "Your sister reminded me that I had betrayed her trust four times. Twice because I was too much a Watcher, twice because I wasn’t enough of one." When he looked back at her, she had to wrap her arms around herself to keep away the cold. "I can’t betray her again by disregarding her wishes. Please don’t ask me to."

"Okay. Okay, I get what you’re saying." She made herself keep smiling, even as her mind kept churning over the possibilities. "And you know what, Giles? You’re a Watcher always and forever. But I’m not going to bug you about it any more."

Although his mouth quirked a little, he just said, "I’ll believe that when I see it." Then he flipped through his papers. "Back to work. David Penn was the name – er, a link to Pennith, wouldn’t you agree? We should check the Frontier records for a connection."

Even as she said "sure," even as she took notes and made a couple of suggestions of her own, one hand went to the smudged copy of the Frontier blueprint. Signs of walls and doors, signs of boundaries to cross, she thought.

There had to be another way in.

***

Red, yellow, green – finally the signal changed. The traffic on Oxford Street annoyed Anya: too many cars and busses in the road, far too many people getting in her damn way. But now they had an opening. "Come on, Andrew! And stop looking at yourself in the store windows."

"I’m not! Sorta." Puffing a little in the heat, he hurried his steps to catch up to her. "But can we stop at HMV or the Virgin Megastore on the way back? I need some research material."

"What could you possibly research at a home-entertainment establishment?" she said. The opening in the traffic widened – clutching the package for Cluth the Gifted in one hand and a fistful of Andrew’s shirt in the other, she bolted in between a Mini and a big honking Mercedes. Literally honking.

"Oh man, oh man," Andrew whimpered as they slipped between the cars. When they stepped onto the opposite kerb, however, he said more calmly, "Um. Well, with my new spy-detective duties, I thought maybe I’d revisit the James Bond film oeuvre–?"

"That’s a dumb idea. Tradecraft can be learned best by observation, and by reading the right books. Either we can stop in at Foyles on the way back, or you can borrow mine." She cast an appraising glance at him. "Actually, you seem like Albert, the helpful servant and office boy in the Tommy and Tuppence books. He’s young and overly dramatic too."

"But does he do any spying or detecting of his own?"

"Yes. But you don’t have to go tonight if you don’t want to–"

"No, don’t leave me behind!" he said quickly. "I just want a plan of action, that’s all. And maybe someone to help me."

"Rupert and I won’t send you in unprepared," she said, though just saying her partner’s name called up another wave of nerves and deep worry. Last night after their incredible rough-tender-talking sex, the aftershocks of which still had her quivering, he’d fallen into bed and unconsciousness. Of course he generally slept well after lovemaking, but this was different – he didn’t hog the bed, he didn’t snore, he didn’t move at all. He slept like...she wouldn’t allow herself to finish the expression. But he looked so sick when he woke up, and he looked so sick still.

Swallowing her fears, she said, "We’ll work it out. But you tell us if you’re too scared. Although Rupert’s got this crazy idea that the mission has to be tonight, we could put it off."

Andrew stopped in the middle of the sidewalk – a pedestrian smacking into him from behind, a shout of "Hey, you fookin’ halfwit" – and said, "Why are we going into the club, anyway? If there’s known badness at Body Frontiers, I mean."

"Because we feel that investigating what might be a nasty place and with multiple exits would be more sensible than charging back into the lair of a bad-mojo specialist who jabs people in the arms with poisoned tattoo needles, a place with a tunnel but no other way out–"

"Oh. You think Giles was poisoned – oh." He turned white, but said bravely, "Got it. You can count on me, Anya."

"Good ex-villainous boy." She patted his back, which made him cough. "Are you ready for our own reconnoitre?"

"Yes I am." He pulled himself to his full height and took on what either was a top-secret spy attitude or an indication of gas. "Lead on, mon capitaine."

It was only a few steps to the Mysterious Emporium, The Best for the Most Discerning Demon and Half-Demon. After a brief discussion, she let Andrew rap high and low, let him say the password – "Nalph, there is no password"– and then followed him into the almost empty shop.

As usual, Nalph sat on the counter; this time he was playing with his dreadlocks and talking to Cluth the Gifted. He showed his teeth to them: "Jenkins and assistant! We’ve been waiting."

"Hello, Nalph. And here, as you requested, Cluth – the scrying mirror from your home dimension."

When she showed the package to the half-Biw mage, she thought he was going to cry. "You contacted Biw, Miss Jenkins? You spoke to someone there? I’ve been cut off so long–"

"Oh no. I knew a guy in Reykjavik, who knew a werewolf in Boston, who knew a guy in Moose Jaw." She smiled. "There’s a Biw outpost in the Canadian plains, isn’t that weird? Something about the wheat."

Nalph hopped off the counter, bouncing as he landed. "Ah. I thought they’d be able to help you, Cluth. They understand the proper way of doing things."

Without mishap, Andrew pulled the mirror out of the box and then bowed in just the right degree. "Your mirror, sir. Courtesy of Giles and Jenkins, Investigations and Acquisitions."

Demon and human breaths were held until the tool was in Cluth’s hands. Preternaturally long nails clicking against the silver, his smushed dog-nose smelling his reflection, he whispered, "Oh thank you so very much! How much do I owe you?"

As Anya handed Andrew the bill and then Andrew repeated the offer-and-bow move to Cluth, Nalph hopped away. The Ihioo baby skulls chattered as he went through the curtain into the back area. It was all Anya could do to keep her eyes on the cheque Cluth was writing; she wanted to know what Nalph was doing back there. But she couldn’t hear anything –

"Say, do you two have to pay the tribute?" Cluth whispered, his words almost masked by his ripping the cheque from the book. "I hear that some humans have been asked. By them."

"Not yet. But we know it’s coming," Anya said carefully.

He scratched at his face, one nail almost digging into his eye. "Takes lots of money, energy, and souls, you know. Lots and lots to get enough to open what we need to –"

Without warning, the Ihioo skulls chattered again, the curtain parted, and Nalph leapt onto the top of the counter. "Is the transaction complete?"

"Yes, yes, very happy, very pleased. You are a great facilitator, Mikh Lord," Cluth said, throwing a handful of demon coin onto the counter beside him. "But now I should toddle home. With my new mirror, I shall be able to see better at last!"

"Be careful of what you see, Gifted one," Nalph called after him, as the blue door shut with a snap and a rise of dust. Then Nalph smiled downward. "Yes, Jenkins and assistant, be careful of what you see."

"Why, of course. You know Giles and I are extremely careful, and Andrew is learning from us," she said. But she wondered – _Mikh_ Lord? Since when?

The demon crossed his claws, his smile widening. "Now that we’re alone...I’ve been wondering if there was any possibility of obtaining another Nri-encrusted cup, she who was Anyanka."

"There’s always a chance. Why?" Smiling back, she turned as subtly as she could toward the display board on the wall. The Yeangelt flyer in the centre was different; the sigil was the same, but the word had disappeared. Just the sign – bigger now, darker– below the name Yeangelt.

And there was something green marking a torn edge of the Giles and Jenkins business card. Looked like acid, like liquid dripping down an ex-Watcher’s cracked windows. She had the sudden, intense desire to get their card the hell down from there.

Nalph said, "Unexpected expenses; changes, surface and deep. You know. And what are you looking at?"

"Just examining the advertisements. I was thinking we should remove our card, actually. We’ve developed a nice client base, human as well as demon, and since we’ve established word-of-mouth, well, we might not need this kind of publicity any more."

As she reached for the card, the demon leapt in a blur of indigo and teeth, one blue hand locking around her wrist. Although she couldn’t help her shiver, she didn’t move when his claws nipped at the skin. "Now you know better than that, she who was Anyanka. In my shop, I decide what goes in and comes out," he said in a growl.

"My mistake, Nalph. Please accept my apologies," she said quietly, over her nerves.

One last press of the claws, not enough to break the skin, before he hopped back. "Apology accepted. Now – shall we have a pot of tea, talk a little about the vessel I require and perhaps some of your cases underway?"

"Eep," Andrew said as the Mikh batted at him in passing, but he managed not to fall down.

Even though she felt like shrieking and running back to Rupert, the one in the family who really understood strategy, Anya beamed once more. "Nalph, tea and gossip would be lovely!"

***

The Thames was blue today under a cloudless summer sky. Nice day to wait outside for a spymaster, Giles thought, even though he felt like utter hell.

Narrowing his aching eyes against the glare, Giles leaned on the wall and looked at the river. As the water lapped on the stone, the accusations rose again. Dawn’s question had brought back Buffy’s judgement against him on that horrible night, spoken again on the day Dawn had arrived in London. Betrayal number one: on Buffy’s eighteenth birthday, he had chosen the Council. Two: when he killed Ben, he had chosen to kill to protect her. Three: when he left after she’d been brought back, he had chosen to protect himself. Four: when she and Spike wouldn’t take care of the trigger, he had chosen to protect Anya.

Like a dark tidemark left behind, there was the ugly recognition that he wouldn’t change some of his decisions. He’d still have killed Ben. In that awful last year, he’d have dealt with Spike differently, more openly, but he still wouldn’t have trusted Buffy to handle it. Too much a Watcher, yet not enough. It didn’t balance out.

He gazed out at the morning light on the water, listened to the water lap against stone.

And he smelled the expensive tobacco before he even heard the voice drawl, "Hello, Rupert. Where’s the lovely wife today?"

"Jools." He didn’t turn around. "Didn’t I just speak to you?"

"Yes, well, after a small fact-finding mission, I persuaded your little assistant to tell me where you were." Siviter mimicked Giles’s pose, though he leaned far more nonchalantly. "I went out to my grandmother’s site, Vauxhall Cross being so conveniently located to the salubrious township of Brixton. Yet when I arrived, I saw loads and loads of fire-engines, all around a tattoo-artist’s establishment."

"A fire at Body Frontiers?" At that, Giles did turn his head.

"Yes. Interesting, isn’t it. Place was a dead loss, so to speak." Jools took another long drag on his cigarette, sent smoke into the sun. "And you say you found a tunnel between the burned-out building and the nightclub, under my grandmother’s land." All affectation dropping away, he met Giles’s gaze. "You must be getting closer to the Xet conspiracy, Rupert."

"Maybe." He looked back out at the water, eyes narrowing further against the brightness. "Does this mean that the Giles and Jenkins job is over?"

"Oh no, no. Find out all you can. My grandmama won’t sell to this David Penn, obviously, but if there’s nasty business in the cellar–"

"‘Something nasty in the woodshed,’" Giles quoted, suddenly amused.

"Don’t try to be witty, Rupert, you might hurt yourself." Another blast of smoke, a chuckle. "We want to know what lies beneath the surface, don’t we."

"Not always."

They stood there for a second or two, listening to the river, before Siviter said, "Wolfram and Hart’s resources don’t tempt you in this?"

"No. I don’t trust them." Giles glanced at him. "I do trust Wes, but individuals can’t always change a system. Institutional rot, you know."

"That’s what I thought." In one of his lightning-flashes, Siviter turned on his heel in the direction of Vauxhall Cross. Saying, "Best of luck to you and your helpmeet, Rupert. Let me know if I can assist in any way – Ah, little sister! Late as usual," he disappeared through a sudden clutch of tourists.

And Harry was there on the other side. "What did Siviter want?"

"Private business." Giles locked his hands together, to keep back a sudden wave of irrational anger. "Hello, Harry. Why did you need to see me?"

"Because of an alarming propensity for taking up my team’s attention," Harry said. "You’re an informant, not an agent, nor someone running a fucking section – yet every time I look around, you’re getting my people involved in your games."

"Fighting a terror campaign, old man. I, I ask for help when I need it." Sometimes, he silently qualified.

"A terror campaign against demons, not humans. And help will not be forthcoming today. Especially when you have encouraged Zoe to chase after ghosts."

He spared a thought for young Geoff Perry. "Humans have died as well – but I see. This is about Tom Quinn. Does it bother you to know he didn’t betray you, Harry?"

"I am thrilled that he wasn’t a traitor. But the boy is dead." Harry looked out at the water. "Drowned himself when it got too difficult."

"No, he didn’t. He’s just lost." Tara’s voice, speaking through Cassa Dreams, floated through his mind.

"That bloody doesn’t matter. Let me remind you of your mission, Giles, which is to bring Zoe intelligence product I can use. Don’t go off on wild tangents, don’t involve my team unnecessarily, and I don’t give one good fuck about your own concerns, is that clear?"

"Clearer than the Thames." Giles pushed himself away from the railing, allowing himself the brief petty pleasure of looming over the man. "Since I’m not part of your team, let _me_ say – bugger off, Harry." Walking away, he raised his hand imperatively, and a taxi swerved to a stop in front of him.

Harry called, "Just to remind you, I’ll expect your report at the usual time."

Sodding administrative ponce, worse than Quentin fucking Travers, should have punched the tosser in the face – Giles slammed the cab door on all the insults he was mentally hurling at the git, then sighed. "Gilbert Place," he told the driver.

Even as the car pulled away from the river, his mobile rang. Dear God he hoped it was Anya, he needed her. But the number on the display shocked him. A click, then: "Buffy, are you all right? What can I do for you?"

"You can tell me why I just got a call from Robson, saying that Dawn had requested special permission to go on some stupid spy-job with you tonight! And, Giles, you can tell me why he _gave_ it to her!"

"Dawn called Robson? She went over my head and yours to get Council authorisation?" For fuck’s sake, after all his efforts to say ‘no,’ after his dramatic revelation – he couldn’t stop a wild burst of laughter. It just poured out, even though it hurt his aching head to laugh that hard. In the midst of his hysteria he managed to say, "She’s going to be one bloody brilliant Watcher."

Somebody had to be, he thought, even as the laughter drained away. Wasn’t him.

***

The seemingly small, aging woman in the hidden room finished her last square of silk, tied off the knot and then bit at the thread.

When the thread fell in two, the black candles wavered, then flickered higher, flame to flame.

The tattooed man in the bed jolted, a current of fire running over and through pattern and sign until his body seemed alight.

Taking the silk pieces in her hands, the woman pressed them together, murmuring dark words, rocking back and forth. The edges bound together, fold to fold, and she tossed the joined pieces into the air over his body. "Let him wake on the Day of the Dead, when he shall fulfill his task," she said. "Let him wake, healthy and whole, to take his rightful place."

When the silk fell like leaves over him, he sank deeper down. Yet the light coming from him remained.

The woman stood, stretching sore muscles. At the sound of the door opening behind her, she said, "Pennith, are you come to see my progress?"

"Yes indeed," he said. Bitter almond mingled with the scents of earth and magick, as he joined her in gazing at Griffin’s draped body. Conversationally he said, "You’ve told me so often that you can’t see the future, but last night, when it seemed like he had been taken and our plans ruined, you were there to save us. You got him out of danger, you knew the proper magicks. Are you sure you don’t know what’s coming?"

"I wish I did. Cassa Dreams would still be collecting for us if so." Her hand, still cramped from sewing, found his. "But I believe in preparing for anything and everything. Last night Griffin was letting in the past, and you know as well as I do that’s rarely good." She hissed, an echo of his own. "I wish I could have seen that visitor more closely. He was protected somehow."

"Never mind, my lady." In a tone lower than low, he said, "Rebels have been killed, and we’re back on track. I’ll bring you some fine souls and spirits tonight – for you, and for the Xet."

"Two storage rooms full, one more to go," she said, smiling at him. "It shall be three and one, as planned."

Together they watched unburning flame wash over patterns and signs, under the silk.

***

The green waters closed over his head, the river mud dragging on his feet, in his veins. He dropped faster, weighed down by stones in his pockets he hadn’t put there. The dark and the mud almost had him, until a small hand caught him, pulled him up. Water rushed away, sweetness and bells as he broke the surface, and the touch of his dearest’s lips on his, giving him the air he needed –

"Honey. Honey, wake up," Anya whispered against his mouth.

Giles fought to open his eyes, to breathe. Right. He was in bed, in their twilit bedroom. She lay beside and over him, propped up on one elbow, her other hand holding his. And she kissed him again, one more brush of sweetness.

He struggled up onto his own elbows, blinking against dusk and lingering nightmare. "Er, how long have I been asleep?"

"Sleep is not how I’d describe it," she said sharply. "I’ve seen your naps, and that, Rupert Giles, was not a nap."

Coughing, he tried to focus. "I’m fine, Anya. How long?"

"Three long, unconscious hours." She poked at his chest with her index finger. "I don’t _think_ you’re fine."

"I’m all right, really." He tightened his hold on her, seeking a way to distract her. "Er, did we just play a reversal of the old tale? I thought it was Prince Charming who woke Sleeping Beauty with a kiss, not the other way round."

"Don’t be ridiculous. You’re not anything like Prince Charming." She pulled free of him and sat up.

It was odd how her words hurt him; not even a glance at her hand, where that bloody pretend ring still flashed in the dying light, could ease the sting. He sank back on the bed, throwing one arm across his eyes. "No. No, I’m not."

"Of course not, and who wants him? Prince Charming was a boy – been there, done that, became a vengeance demon when he left me. What I want and need is a man." Letting his arm fall, he opened his eyes to her smile. " _You_ , Rupert."

"Ah. But you are Beauty to me." Which was ridiculously sentimental yet entirely true, he thought. He smiled back at her.

She dropped down over him, her arms around his neck. "Oh, honey, you’re so sweet. But actually, you got your story wrong. See, the whole Sleeping Beauty deal was actually a setup for an alliance between two well-off families, but this Enwaz demon intervened–"

"Darling, seriously." Shrugging off his headache and the lethargy holding him down, he slipped one hand around the back of her neck, brought her even closer. His finger tickling her nape, his mouth inches from hers, he said, "You can instruct me on truth and fiction later. Shall we have sex now, before the mission?"

A long, deep kiss, fluid as a river, before two hands planted hard on his chest. "No, you’re a sick man. In body, I mean, although your current mental health is also worrying."

He yanked her back down. With a ghost of a grin, he said, "Come on. Six minutes, in and out. Set us right up for tonight’s work."

She smacked him on the shoulder. "Stop it! Don’t you realise that you still look like hell, and that you’d be better served to get yourself to the healer rather than think about spying tonight?" Her hand slipped down to where he was already stirring; when she brushed against him, she frowned. "How is it possible that you’re even partially aroused, as terrible as you must feel?"

"I love you."

"You’d better. But settle down, I want to check something."After rolling off his body, she began to work the sleeve over his elbow on his hurt arm. He hissed out a warning, but she kept on going until she exposed his tattoo. The point where Griffin’s needle had gone in was bruised purple-green, and tendrils of dark streaked out from it.

When her fingertip touched the edge of the wound, he swallowed a groan.

She said firmly, "That’s what I thought. While you were unconscious, I put the coven’s healer on alert. We can be in Devon in a few hours to let Margaret look at your wound, honey, because this isn’t good. We shouldn’t investigate tonight."

He had to make her understand. "I told you they burned down Body Frontiers. It means that we’re getting close, Anya. We need more to go with our research, and this could be our last chance."

"Maybe it isn’t."

"We can’t risk it." He pulled away from her and swung himself off the bed. Ignoring the stab of dizziness, he stood up. "You don’t have to go if you don’t want to."

"You’re such an idiot. Tuppence goes where Tommy goes, even if Tommy is being stupid." She hurled herself off the bed and threw an arm around his waist. "Andrew and Dawn are prepped, the car’s ready, and I talked to Willow about the protection spells. Apparently you’ve already consulted her on this?"

"Yes. You see?" He leaned down to kiss her. "I’m not stupid."

"Hah." She nipped at his mouth before saying, "You’re often idiotic, obstinate, cranky, stuffy, and about as far from Prince Charming as any one man could be."

"Then why are you with me, Anya?" The question came from somewhere deeper than he knew.

"We’ve covered this, honey. Because I love you more than anything, and you’re mine and I’m yours. Remember?"

"Dearest–" He lost his words. Instead, he caught her hand with the ring and brought it to his lips. When he kissed the gold and the warm skin around it, she shivered, drawing closer to him. And they stood there locked together, until he kissed her hand again and said, "Right. I’d better get ready."

"Guess so. If we’re going to do this dumb thing." Letting go, she watched him walk into the bathroom.

After the door shut behind him, he turned on the water, plunging his hands in to wash his face, scrub off the dreams and the ache. She wasn’t wrong–Christ, he did feel terrible. But then a thrown shoe slammed against the door, and she shouted, "Hey, I just realised! _Six minutes, in and out?_ You think we could manage sex in six minutes?"

Clear water and laughter took away the pain for the moment.

***

They stood in a pool of blackness a block away from their goal, bass thumping under their feet in a perfect soundtrack to four super-spies out for a night’s adventure –

"Andrew!" Giles’s sharp voice woke him from the fantasy.

"Sorry." Andrew smoothed down the tight-fitting shirt that he and Dawn had bought that afternoon along with his temporary blue hair dye, then checked the pocket of his trousers for the demon-summoning whistle he’d prepared. "Wells, Andrew Wells – ready for action."

"Summers, Dawn Summers, is ready too," she said.

He glanced at her. She didn’t look like his peach Dawnie any more; barely dressed and all made up, she looked older, a sleek Bond-girl cat, Pussy Galore or Jinx except not really like Halle Berry. "You’re not just a junior Watcher, Dawn. You look like a perfect girl-spy."

"Which defeats the purpose and is bad tradecraft, as I’ve been told," Anya said briskly. "But I think this works for tonight. Now, repeat the plan one last time."

"We get in, we’ve got the money to bribe our way in if necessary, and I text you when we’re past the door. We give you five minutes, with me observing as much as I can, then it’s Andrew’s turn," Dawn said.

"I summon Ttoc demons, who are scary-looking yet herbivorous, and also conveniently located under Waterloo Station. With their speed they should be here within seconds."

"And then we get out fast and get back to the car," Dawn finished.

"Good. Now you’ve got your dagger and your stake, and inscribed the protection runes?" Giles said. "Buffy’s angry enough about this evening as it is. You need to be prepared."

Dawn took Andrew’s arm, then grinned. "Prepared and protected, with Magic Marker sigils on our backs. We’ll see you guys in a few."

As they walked away, he cast a quick glance back; Anya and Giles practically melted into the shadows in their black gear, disappearing into the night. But he knew they were there. They counted on him and Dawn, they had given them both this chance to overcome the past, to fight for truth and justice and wear cool clothes–

"Andrew, stop humming."

"What?" he said, coming back to the present. They were only a few doors from the Frontier: bass louder now, screams from inside, people milling around the doors, lit by flickering green neon. He could see a couple of demons in the crowd.

"You’re humming. I know it, it’s...oh my God, it’s the theme from _Alias_." Smiling, she did a little dance, a shimmer under the streetlight. "I call Sydney!"

"I call Vaughn!"

"Dude, please. You are _so_ Marshall."

"Am not! I’m Vaughn, really – watch, I’ll wrinkle my forehead heroically–" The resulting discussion took them into the line, past a couple of extremely hot guys, um, and girls, and two chilly-skinned individuals he identified as vampires, and up to the front.

A bald, muscular man in mesh clothing stood in front of the steel door, scrutinising everyone who wanted in. Dawn didn’t even wait for a signal; using a move she’d stolen from Faith torturing poor beautiful Xander in a Cleveland nightclub, she stepped into the man’s personal space, ran her fingers up the tight pectorals, and said, "Hey. You the guy letting people in?"

Weirdly, the doorman sniffed at her, and not in a checking-out-what-shampoo-could-make-hair-gleam-like-that way. "You smell strange, little one," he said. He pulled her further into the light.

"You hurt my feelings," she said, all big eyes and pouting lips. In another Faith move, she slid her hand further down to his stomach, spread her fingers wide. "I’m clean. But not too clean."

Someone from behind them shouted, "Come on, mate, let ‘em in!" Other voices agreed, rumbling from all around them. Andrew stepped closer to her, putting his hand on her back.

The man shouted, "No one fucking gets in if you don’t shut it!" Then he shrugged and looked at them both. "Go on, children."

Andrew slipped him the money, got a squeeze on the ass in repayment. Taking a deep breath, he said. "Ready, sweetie?"

A blast of music shivered the doorframe – a female vocalist singing "Get down, happy people" over bass like a bludgeon–

"Ready, sweetie," Dawn answered, before she danced into the darkness behind the door.

***

The steel back door to the Frontier shone under two security lights.

It was deserted here: from their place in the shadows a few steps away, Anya saw no visible people or demons, but a truck was parked outside by the chainlink fence separating the alley and Lady Rosemary’s levelled building site. And there was the boium tree from Grittnak’s, set out forlornly in a dust heap. Rupert’s mouth had tightened dangerously when he’d seen it.

The air still smelled of smoke and magic from the Body Frontiers fire, and the fence rattled even though there was no wind. The music from the club, loud enough to shudder the concrete walls, wasn’t enough to drown out that rattle.

She stepped closer to Rupert, sliding her hands under his backpack to touch him. He smiled over his shoulder, a flash in the darkness, before looking back at the door. Under her fingertips she could feel the pain-shivers he kept denying. Her stupid Watcher-spy, never listening to her wise counsel; he should be at home, resting. They all should be at home.

The mobile in her pocket vibrated on: _No problem_ , the message read. "They’re in, honey," she whispered.

He nodded, then he prowled into the light and ran his hands around the door. Looking back, he mouthed, "No wards," before trying the back door, which swung open at the first touch.

That meant there would likely be security staff. Clutching her dagger nervously, she followed him in.

The plans had shown a long corridor, which on their right led to a storage room for the drinks stuff. To their left were the offices – and, yep, right by the back door was a guard.

Or rather, on the floor next to the back door was a guard. Rupert had done something too fast for her to see, but the uniformed guy had crumpled like a discarded invoice. She opened the back door, and Rupert dragged him outside. Thump, thump went the bass; thump, thump went the wounded guy’s body on the concrete.

She grabbed Rupert’s shirt and brought him back inside.

Their intermediate goal was a small room which on the plans looked like a storage closet, located next to the main office. This time she led, her partner on her heels. No footsteps could be heard over the music – which meant they were as vulnerable to surprise as the people who ran the place. She hurried her stride.

When they hit the storage room’s door, Rupert held her back, his big hand on her shoulder. He put his other hand out; at the near-contact, green sparks hissed from the spaces between door and frame. So this was warded. Interesting. Also terrifying.

Holding on to his belt-loops, she watched him fish out the bag of crushed Hyban beetles – also from Grittnak’s, she thought with a pang. A handful of the mixture on the lock, a whispered incantation, and the door swung open with a dying hiss.

They slipped inside, to blackness and the scent of earth and magick. She could smell bitter almond too. Pennith must have been there recently. A flare, and then light – Rupert had turned on his torch. The place was empty, with an oddly marked wooden floor underneath carpet. She couldn’t read the signs, though, they didn’t look like the familiar sigil. Set into the far wall was another door, which didn’t have a handle.

"Tunnel below the site," he said, almost soundlessly. Going over to it, he flashed his light on the opening. There was a small window inset at eye level – he peered through, but shook his head.

She crowded beside him to look too. The tunnel sloped down, but several feet away floor-to-ceiling shelves began. In the light from the torch, glass dazzled the eye: rows and rows of clear, seemingly empty containers set on the flat surfaces.

"Open door?" she asked.

"Don’t have the word. No handle," he whispered.

Then he put a finger to his lips. She could faintly hear voices coming from the direction of the office. Two deep, deep voices – Pennith, of course, and...the cloaked guy they had met at the Mysterious Emporium that first night of spying, the one asking for tribute.

She caught at Rupert’s hand. He nodded, squeezed her fingers as he passed her the torch, then went to the hall door. His watch-face glinted in the light.

Time for the junior Watchers to do their stuff.

***

 _Plug it in plug it in baby, where you been where you been baby...._

The central room of the Frontier – black walls; a long bar at the back where water, alcohol and drugs (he thought) were being sold; flashing lights, in time with the music; scents of cigarettes and spilled alcohol and too many people dancing, sauntering, and making out on the main level and on the catwalks on either side. Not just people either; he’d identified three more vampires and a couple of half-Myt demons, who could pass for human in a dark place. Looked like some major hunting going on.

And he was stuck in the middle of the dance floor, which wasn’t really one of his best places.

Dawn gyrated against his back, her hands on his waist. "The whole thing’s really turn-of-the-millenium," she whispered in his ear. "I can’t believe the club is so popular."

"Something else must be the draw," he said, reaching back to put his hands on her bottom.

After jumping when his hands made contact, she whispered, "You’re going to pay for that, sweetie–"

"It’s just my cover– I’m supposed to be your date!" he hissed. "What have you seen, anyway?"

"Hello, your cover is you’re my gay best friend! Anya and Giles say to keep it as close to reality as possible." Undulating against him, she took his hands and put them back on his own pockets.

The demon-summoning whistle bit into his hip under the pressure, but he had to clarify: "I keep telling you I’m not gay! I’m, um, open to a variety of partners, thank you."

"Whatever." In a flashy move, very Britney, she whirled away and then back, her hair whipping him in the face as she spun. Ignoring his whimper, she came into his arms to whisper, "At the end of the last song, one of the waiters picked up a guy who was kinda freaking out and took him through that side door."

"To the office area? Where Giles and Anya are?"

"Yes." Her lips on her ear, she breathed, "Come on, before this song’s over–"

 _Plug it in plug it in baby, where you been...._

Fumbling only a little, he got out his demon-summoning whistle. Bringing forth the image of the Ttoc demons in his mind, he focussed on the beat, and then, shielded from view by her body, called them.

No sound from the whistle. Nothing. Strobe lights, same beat shaking the walls. Too many people dancing, watching, or making out. Nothing.

"Did it not work?" she said–

As the main doors shuddered, cracked, then fell. Four large, scaly creatures like baby dragons flew in through the hole, their wings beating like thunder: Ttoc demons, right on schedule.

Above them, around them, the pandemonium began. A siren went off inside, and clubgoers scrambled away from the demons. Tables and chairs crashed to the ground, the catwalks above rocked – and through the side door came a tall, grey-haired man and a cloaked figure.

She said, "There we go. That’s management!"

"Plug it in, plug it in, baby," he said.

After they shared a grin, she pulled her dagger from her boot, twirled it in her fingers. "Okay, now let’s get out of here."

***

When the siren went off, Rupert put his ear to the door. Anya thought this was an unnecessary procedure, because even with the screams and the thunder, anyone could hear Pennith and the cloaked guy’s footsteps running down the hallway.

They hurried out into the corridor too – empty, except for a lone figure crouching on the floor outside the main office, fiddling with ropes that bound his wrists. He looked up as they approached. "Yeah, yeah, are you the ones with the, you know? A little something special for the journey?" Giggling, he played with his bonds, but the knot held.

"Oh good grief, mister," she said, taking out the dagger. Green sparks like those from the storage room door flew when the blade touched rope.

"Hey! Fucking cow, I was waiting for the magick–"

"Run, you stupid sod, before they kill you," Rupert said, booting the man none too gently onto his side. "Or before I do for insulting her."

Not waiting to see if the jerk in fact ran, Rupert headed into the office. After sending one last frown at the now crawling would-have-been-dead person, she followed her partner into the windowless space: carpeted, anchored with a small file cabinet and a messy desk lit by burning black candles.

Without hesitating, he slid his backpack off and started shoving in folders. "You might check the file cabinet."

"I thought we were going to take pictures? I brought the digital camera –"

"Too late for secrecy, now that we let that bloody idiot go. Might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb." He bent down, peering into one of the desk drawers, then looked over the top of his glasses. "Darling?"

"Oh! Oh right, spying now," she said hastily, and ran to the files. It would never do to let him know she’d been distracted by his espionage-competence, even if it was awfully sexy.

The cabinet was unlocked – really, these people had no sense of security whatsoever. Top drawer was just bills, vendor information for drinks and snacks, all normal enough; she left that alone. In the second drawer were only two slim files, which she picked up. _Cup of Xet_ , one said. _Day of the Dead_ , read the other. "I think I found something good," she said–

"Pity you can’t use it, Mrs Beresford," said a basso profundo voice from the door. "Is that your real name, by the way?"

So much for the demon distraction, she thought, fighting off a wave of nausea.

Rupert took a few steps back toward her. "Ah, Pennith. Is that _your_ name, by the way...."

"Why, yes." The man, demon, whatever, walked into the office, his hands fisted by his sides. He looked just as he had at Cassa Dreams’, except the veneer of civility had peeled away, leaving behind green sparks and bitter almond. "What are you two hoping to find, here where you don’t belong?"

"Just looking, old son," Rupert said. "Just–"

He kicked the desk chair toward Pennith, getting him in the knees, then leapt forward and grabbed two of the lit candles from the desk. Touching flame to wood, he muttered something she couldn’t hear. The desk went up like a bomb, exploding fire, a smoke of blood and decay and bad magick.

His body pinned her to the wall, heavy and protective. "Drop," he whispered in her ear, then pulled her down with him. Because he’d prepared her, she went easily.

"Beresfords!" Pennith’s voice began to mutter incantations, the same ones she’d heard at Cassa Dreams’s office that night. The boium tree, the potion –

No time to think. They crawled under the rain of blood-fire: fibres digging at her hands and knees, smoke digging at her lungs, and Rupert beside her, still holding the second lit candle. The music was still playing in the club close by, she could feel the bass in her bones. No time to think.

She could see the door, the light beyond, and she moved faster. He kept up with her, even as the candlewax started to drip, hissing on carpet and skin –

Hissing from above, Pennith struck at Rupert. She could feel the kick in her own ribs, a shockwave of pain from his.

Despite that, Rupert rolled, not away from Pennith but toward him, touching flame to trouser-leg, muttering the spell he’d used. The line of fire circled Pennith’s body, green into black into green again, hissing and hissing.

The sorcerer screamed, high and painful, as he collapsed. Writhing, he got one hand up – oh God, she couldn’t see, looked like a knife smeared with something -- and grabbed onto Rupert’s arm. The wounded one. "Loss," Pennith said, as he cut at his bicep.

Rupert fell hard. He didn’t get up.

No time to think: she grabbed him under his arms, pulling his heavy body out toward the corridor. Behind them Pennith reached out again, fingers clawing at the carpet –

But they were out. After she let Rupert fall, she went back to the office door and slammed it shut. Let the bastard Pennith burn.

Then she fell to her knees beside her man, lifted him as best she could. He was unconscious, barely breathing. "Rupert," she said, brushing her lips over his. It had worked before, it had worked before....

This time he didn’t wake.

With shaking fingers, she found her mobile, sent a text message: Help. Rupert down. Another number, same message. One more number to a distant unit: Come now. Urgent.

Then, between screams and bass on one side and fire-hisses on the other, she rocked him close, her hand with the ring wrapped in his shirt, holding her to him. "Hang on for me, honey. Going to get us out of here. Everything’s going to be all right," she whispered, over and over.

The tears didn’t start until Dawn touched her shoulder.

***

He dreamed of oceans on fire, of strange creatures dragging at his feet, trying to take him under. He could feel the claws tear at him, then smother the wounds with sea-mud from holes in the ocean floor. In his pockets were two halves of a broken gold cup, filled with stones he couldn’t see.

Even in his dream, his arm burned.

He would have sunk through the bottom and never come up if it hadn’t been for her. Her hand was pulling at him, she was calling him sweet names and harsh names in a voice like a bell. He hung on to hear the chimes, swimming up and up and up, the ache drifting away on the current–

When Giles opened his eyes, he didn’t know where he was. Cool, dim room; machines, humming and beeping, although he didn’t seem to be connected to them; hospital smells. Hospital. Right.

He blinked. Anya was sitting in what looked to be a very uncomfortable chair next to his bed. A book was open on her lap, but she wasn’t reading; she gazed at the wall, at nothing. A trick of the light made her look old, tension-lines pulling at her eyes and mouth, body sagging. He didn’t know when he was – he was eighty, maybe, in hospital again, and his beautiful, aging wife waited for him to wake up. For the first time, the idea made him smile. "Darling?" he said, the word scraping against his throat.

The book slipped to the floor. "Rupert?" Then her youthful smile lit up the dimness. "Honey, are you really awake?"

"Yes. I’m fine." He reached out to her, caught her hand, which she clutched as if she were the one in danger of drowning. "I am, aren’t I."

"Yes, you are. Now." Even as her face crumpled, as tears rushed to the surface, she said, "No, I’m not going to do this; the books say I’m supposed to be calm and Britishly composed when you recover." She sniffed hard. "Okay. You’re fine. We got you out of there, and here to hospital where all night the doctors kept telling me you were in a coma like Wesley’s dad, but then a couple of hours ago Margaret and Gillian arrived to chant and apply herbs and fix your various mystical hurts, including the one from Griffin. Now here you are, completely fixed–"

On a sob, she fell forward onto his shoulder, still holding his hand. He interlaced their fingers, feeling a odd pang at the touch of gold. "I _told_ you we should have stayed at home, but no, you had to go be a spy. Had to almost break my heart and leave me, I should have been the one having damn nightmares...." she wept into his hospital gown.

He got his bandaged arm around her, lifted her up onto the bed with him. "Dearest, I’m so sorry."

"You should be. If you weren’t still hurt, I’d hit you very hard for scaring me. And in case you don’t know, I hate hospitals."

"I do know. I’m sorry." He managed to kiss her, taking away some of her tears, swallowing some of his own. "How did you get me out?"

"Dawn and Andrew first, and then Zoe and Danny showed up. You’re very heavy when you’re in a bad-magick coma, do you know that? Anyway, Andrew summoned another round of pesky but not terribly dangerous demons to keep the Frontier security staff busy, and then we got an ambulance." She kissed him again. "Dawn stayed with me all night, but now she and Zoe are going through the files we stole. Some good leads, we think."

"Pennith?"

"Gone." Letting go, she dragged her palms across her eyes and then sat up, still in the circle of his good arm. "He wasn’t in the office when Danny and Zoe went to see – ‘the Mystery of the Locked Room!’ Zoe said– and shortly after the building was evacuated, the whole place blew up. It’s still too hot to look for the door to the tunnel."

"The things one misses when one’s unconscious." He managed a smile, only to wince when she did slap his shoulder. "Anya!"

"Your devil-may-care spy attitude doesn’t fly with me, mister. I want to see sincere remorse for the night you’ve just put me through." But her hand on his was gentle. "You can start when we get home."

"Which will be?" He pulled her closer.

"Tonight, they said. The doctors have to look at you again and say ‘it’s a miracle’ and then there’s paperwork." One more sweet kiss, even a tease of tongue, before she got off the bed. "I should go find Margaret to look you over first, though."

He flexed his hand, the one that had been holding hers; strangely, it was as if he could still feel the pressure, could feel the moment of waking up. "All right. But, er, where’s Andrew?"

"Outside; he refused to leave. Why?"

"I’d like a couple of moments with him before Margaret comes in, if it’s possible."

She examined him closely. "Perhaps you’ve had a previously undetected head injury, if you’re actually asking for him–"

"Please, darling. Then come straight back to me." He managed another smile.

She smiled back. "That, Rupert, you don’t even have to ask."

When the door shut behind her, he looked at his hand, let himself feel. His fears seemed to have dissolved, washed away in the same current that had taken most of his pain, and he knew what he should do at last–

"Giles! Oh _Giles_!" Andrew charged through the door, seemingly intent on hurling himself at the bed.

"Don’t hug me, Andrew," he said quickly. When the boy stopped, hurt, he added, "Still a bit sore, I’m afraid. Er, I understand you did sterling work last night."

"Oh, thank you. Yes, Dawn and I managed well enough," he said. "Junior Watchers, you know."

"Yes. Yes, er, very well done, thank you. Um, I was wondering if you could take on another job for me? A secret from Anya."

***

There were two beds in the hidden room now, revealed by the light from the black candles.

In the second bed lay a burned man, twitching in his uneasy sleep. Beside him, the small woman was once again sewing, needle and thread sliding through a piece of silk. She wept as she worked, tears mingling with the black of the sigil.

Behind her, the door opened. "My lady Yeangelt?" a voice asked. "May I bring you something to eat, or to drink?"

"No food, no drink. But bring me news of those Beresfords. The ones who hurt Pennith." She didn’t look up from her sewing.

"The Beresfords–?"

"Older man, younger woman. Human. Pennith, rest him, had told me that the man stunk of Watcher." At that, she did look up. "Do you know of any such people?"

"No, my lady. Have they – have they ruined your great plans?"

She began to rock back and forth as the needle went through the silk: back, forward, back, forward, the material hissing in her hands. "No. I can revive him in time, have him and Griffin join me on the Day of the Dead. The Terminal shall be opened, despite these setbacks." When she knotted off the thread, Pennith cried out; she rested her hand on his, murmuring soothing nothings. Looking at him, not the door, she said, "But I do need the Cup of Xet, lost for so long. And I want those Beresfords dead, even before the opening kills them and the rest of the humans in this benighted valley."

"Of course," the voice said. "It shall be as you say. I shall listen and watch for them as part of my tribute." And he shut the door, leaving her to her sewing and her grief.

Indigo dreadlocks swaying, Nalph turned and hopped back down the tunnel toward the Magic Emporium’s private area. It was quiet in the afternoons, inside and out. Not yet opening time.

He went to his office, closing the door so he could be alone, so he could think. Beresfords, the lady Yeangelt said.... older man, younger woman, the man stinking of Watcher....

Opening his desk drawer, he took out the Giles and Jenkins business card he’d removed from the bulletin board the day before, after she who had been Anyanka and the little scrambling human had left. Flicking a claw against the linen edge, he considered for a minute.

Then, in a quick movement, he thrust the card into the flame of his lantern. Within seconds, the words and paper had crumpled to nothingness.

That should buy time, he thought. Time was such a useful commodity.

***

"Stop fussing, Anya. I can get out of the cab by myself," Rupert said. Fussily.

As he crawled out of the taxi into the evening, she followed, her fingers tightening on his. "Shut up. If I want to hold onto you, I can."

He was acting very strange and nervous, almost as if he knew – but he couldn’t know. That stupid man didn’t know what nerves were. Forcing herself to breathe, she led him through the open front gate and into their house.

A quick glance around showed that Dawn had lit the candles just as requested, and the French doors to the back were open, also as requested. That boded well for the rest of her requests.

"Oh, darling, the back door’s open. Should we see if there’s anything amiss?"

One hurdle down: she’d wondered how she could maneuver him out there. "Yes, honey, that’s a great idea." But as they strolled through their twilit hall, she did have to check – "So, how’re you doing? Feeling good, feeling strong?"

"For the tenth bloody time, I’m fine. Stop treating me like an invalid, please."

"Well, spending the night by your unconscious manly form tends to make a woman think you’re the next thing to an invalid," she snapped. Then she inhaled hard, this time breathing their own magicks and her own garden through the open doors. Calming. Good.

Even better was his hand lifting to cradle her face. "I’m sorry. I, I just don’t want to be coddled at the moment."

"It’s not easy, but I’ll try," she said, turning her head to kiss his palm.

"Right. Shall we go outside?" He smiled at her. "It’s a lovely night."

It was a lovely evening, its warmth concentrating all the scents of her flowers and herbs. As she’d arranged with Dawn, there was the table on the patio, draped with a cloth and centred by a vase of her own roses, with two chairs beside it and the lanterns she’d chosen. But – she stopped at the threshold – she hadn’t asked for the champagne cooler or the two champagne flutes. She hadn’t asked for her favourite Motown compilation, the one Rupert hated, to be playing on Andrew’s portable stereo.

He also stared at the table, muttering, "I don’t remember asking for flowers, should have done." Then he sent her a sidelong glance.

"Rupert, did you arrange a little surprise for me?" she said.

"Did you arrange a little surprise for _me_?" he countered.

Yes, but she’d planned on leading up to it more, with some casual conversation, some nibbly things from the Almeida Brasserie, and maybe some fizzy water, which reminded her – "Excuse me, how can you have champagne so soon after mortal illness?"

"Wasn’t a mortal illness, for fuck’s sake. And I checked with Margaret."

"Okay, okay, you don’t have to snap." She swallowed hard. "But yes, I need to...I want to...honey, would you open the champagne for us?"

"Er, right." After he ran his hand through her hair in the way she liked best, he started on the bottle. As he worked: "Go on. What’s on your mind, darling?"

She went to the nearest chair, where, as arranged, the little box she’d sent Dawn to buy that afternoon rested. Her hands were shaking, which she told herself was ridiculous. She was just asking for what she wanted, that was all. He always said– "Rupert, you know how you always say that you want me to have what I want?"

"Yes. And I do." After working the metal cap off, he fished out his handkerchief to get out the cork. "Is there, er, something specific you want?"

"Yes." She watched him pop the cork with a gentle hiss. He sent her a quick smile, then poured the champagne rather professionally into the flutes. She had no idea he even liked champagne, she’d have arranged it if she had. Taking the glass he offered her, she said, "Um, while I was waiting for you to wake up, I finished _The Fashion in Shrouds_."

"You want another Allingham novel?" He sipped at the drink.

"No, I– well, yes, I enjoyed her work, but that’s not the point. At the end of the book, when Albert is hurt and then rescued, he and Amanda have a discussion about their fake engagement."

"I vaguely remember that." Setting his glass down on the table, he stepped closer to her. His eyes were clear now, the dark circles gone; silver and sex in the twilight, he looked like her man again. Always.

It gave her confidence to continue, to go for what she wanted. "Okay. Well, they decide that they’ll just go ahead and make the pretend thing real, which seemed like an excellent idea. If we made the pretend ring you gave me mean something real, you see."

His hand closed over hers, the one with the ring. Before she dropped anything, she put her own glass down, then let him pull her hard against him. "Anya, are you asking me to marry you?" he said, in his softest, most Rupert voice, which she could barely hear over the music.

"Yes. And I sent Dawn to buy you a ring to match mine, even though you’ve been so cranky about the style and everyth–" Then she couldn’t talk, because she’d been lifted onto her toes, because he was kissing her, all champagne and heat and love. All her fears drifted away.

Too soon he set her away from him, his big hands on her bare shoulders. "The answer is yes, in case you had any doubts," he said, flashing one of those grins she’d never seen until they were in love. Oh she loved him, and she’d forgotten to say it, damn it – but he was talking again. "Still, trust you to bollocks up my plans."

"What?"

"I wait forty-nine years to propose to the woman I love, and you beat me to it. Isn’t that just like you." One more kiss, a swoop in and out, before he got an envelope out of his jacket pocket. "Here. I sent Andrew out this afternoon for these."

"But you haven’t opened my box yet."

"Darling, just open the envelope." He smiled, a little nervously.

Her hands were shaking again, but she managed to rip into it. And she stared. Inside were two tickets for the monster-truck exhibition at Earls Court on Friday, and – a ring. An engagement ring. A big, honking diamond engagement ring, the sight of which did nothing to stop her trembles. "Oh, Rupert!"

"I’ve said I’ll marry you, but just to be sure – I love you more than anything, dearest. Will you marry me?" Another smile, less nervous. "If we apply for the licence tomorrow, we can be married in fifteen days."

"Honey, yes! I love you, which I forgot to say before, and yes and yes and yes!"

This called for celebration. Even as he reached for her, she pushed him down into the other chair and climbed into his lap. He settled her more comfortably, her dress raking up around her hips as her legs fell open around his waist, his arms banding around her back. Then she kissed him, mouth tasting, tongue dipping in to enjoy and play what was hers.

He started a gentle rocking motion where her most sensitive spot met his hardening cock under his clothes – he had the most amazing recovery time from mystical comas – and she moaned at the pleasure. God, he just fit, and he wasn’t even inside yet. Except he was inside where it counted, always hers, and she always his.

Still: "Are you sure you can celebrate our betrothal this way?"

"You inspire me. And I checked about this too." He lifted himself just a little, circled his hips against her, and she shivered, melting more. Going to be a hell of a dry-cleaning bill for those trousers, she thought dizzily. "But there’s something we should do before this goes any further."

"Actually put on the rings, you mean?"

When he kissed her again, she lost the thread of her thoughts. Laughing, he said, "All right, two things."

***

From his vantage point at the attic window, Andrew lowered his binoculars, then gave a thumbs-up to Dawn. "We have engagement!"

Wriggling happily, she said into the phone, "Willow, we have engagement! It’s so great!"

He looked back outside. "And now we have porn, right there in the back yard. Boy, we don’t even need cable."

"You are so gross, Andrew," she said, pulling him back from the window–

Just as Anya’s voice yelled, "Okay, you two! I’ve left pub-money on the kitchen table; Jo’s working at the Duke of Nowhere tonight."

"Don’t come back until closing time!" Giles shouted. "And, both of you, thanks."

Dawn grinned, falling against Andrew’s back and holding on. "So very cool, Willow," she said once more. "We have _engagement_!"

***

In the Cleveland apartment she shared, Willow couldn’t help a grin of her own and a happy, loud, "Oh wow, I’m stunned. And pleased, and stunned, and did I say stunned? Engagement!"–

Just as the front door opened hours before schedule, and her roommates, back from the airport, walked in. "‘Engagement?’" Xander said as he put down Buffy’s bag. "Who got engaged?"


End file.
